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The ALASKAN 
























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IT WAS AS IF THE MAM^ WAS DEIJBEI^ATELY INSULTING HER 




THE ALASKAN 

A NOVEL OF THE NORTH 


BY 

JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD 


AUTHOR OF 

THE VALLEY OF SILENT MEN, 
THE FLAMING FOREST, 
THE COUNTRY BEYOND, Etc. 


ILLUSTRATED BY 

WALT LOUDERBACK 



GROSSET & DUNLAP 

PUBLISHERS NEW YORK 


Made in the United States of America 










Copyright, 1922, by International Magazine Company. Copyright, 1929, by 
International Magazine Company. Copyright, 1929, by Cosmopolitan Book 
Corporation, New York. All rights reserved, including that of translation 
into foreign languages, including the Scandinavian* 

■ 

Ri • 

4- 


UtM<\ 



Printed in the United States of America 


To the strong-hearted men and women of Alaska, 
the new empire rising in the North, it is for me 
an honor and a privilege to dedicate this work. 

JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD 

Owosso, Michigan 
August z, 1923 

































THE ALASKAN 


CHAPTER I 

/^APTAIN RIFLE, gray and old in the Alaskan 
Steamship service, had not lost the spirit of his 
youth along with his years. Romance was not dead in 
him, and the fire which is built up of clean adventure 
and the association of strong men and a mighty country 
had not died out of his veins. He could still see the 
picturesque, feel the thrill of the unusual, and—at 
times—warm memories crowded upon him so closely 
that yesterday seemed today, and Alaska was young 
again, thrilling the world with her wild call to those 
who had courage to come and fight for her treasures, 
and live—or die. 

Tonight, with the softly musical throb of his ship 
under his feet, and the yellow moon climbing up from 
behind the ramparts of the Alaskan mountains, some¬ 
thing of loneliness seized upon him, and he said simply: 

“That is Alaska.” 

The girl standing beside him at the rail did not turn, 
nor for a moment did she answer. He could see her 
profile clear-cut as a cameo in the almost vivid light, 


2 THE ALASKAN 

and in that light her eyes were wide and filled with a 
dusky fire, and her lips were parted a little, and her slim 
body was tense as she looked at the wonder of the moon 
silhouetting the cragged castles of the peaks, up where 
the soft, gray clouds lay like shimmering draperies. 

Then she turned her face a little and nodded. “Yes, 
Alaska,” she said, and the old captain fancied there was 
the slightest ripple of a tremor in her voice. “Your 
Alaska, Captain Rifle.” 

Out of the clearness of the night came to them a 
distant sound like the low moan of thunder. Twice be¬ 
fore, Mary Standish had heard it, and now she asked: 
“What was that? Surely it can not be a storm, with 
the moon like that, and the stars so clear above 1” 

“It is ice breaking from the glaciers and falling into 
the sea. We are in the Wrangel Narrows, and very 
near the shore, Miss Standish. If it were day you could 
hear the birds singing. This is what we call the Inside 
Passage. I have always called it the water-wonderland 
of the world, and yet, if you will observe, I must be 
mistaken—for we are almost alone on this side of the 
ship. Is it not proof? If I were right, the men and 
women in there—dancing, playing cards, chattering— 
would be crowding this rail. Can you imagine humans 
like that? But they can’t see what I see, for I am a 
ridiculous old fool who remembers things. Ah, do you 
catch that in the air, Miss Standish—the perfume of 
flowers, of forests, of green things ashore? It is faint, 
but I catch it” 


THE ALASKAN 


3 


“And so do I.” 

She breathed in deeply of the sweet air, and turned 
then, so that she stood with her back to the rail, facing 
the flaming lights of the ship. 

The mellow cadence of the music came to her, soft- 
stringed and sleepy; she could hear the shuffle of danc¬ 
ing feet. Laughter rippled with the rhythmic thrum 
of the ship, voices rose and fell beyond the lighted 
windows, and as the old captain looked at her, there 
was something in her face which he could not under¬ 
stand. 

She had come aboard strangely at Seattle, alone and 
almost at the last minute—defying the necessity of 
making reservation where half a thousand others had 
been turned away—and chance had brought her under 
his eyes. In desperation she had appealed to him, and 
he had discovered a strange terror under the forced 
calm of her appearance. Since then he had fathered 
her with his attentions, watching closely with the wis¬ 
dom of years. And more than once he had observed 
that questing, defiant poise of her head with which she 
was regarding the cabin windows now. 

She had told him she was twenty-three and on her 
way to meet relatives in Nome. She had named cer¬ 
tain people. And he had believed her. It was impos¬ 
sible not to believe her, and he admired her pluck in 
breaking all official regulations in coming aboard. 

In many ways she was companionable and sweet. 
Yet out of his experience, he gathered the fact that she 


4 THE ALASKAN 

was under a tension. He knew that in some way she 
was making a fight, but, influenced by the wisdom of 
three and sixty years, he did not let her know he had 
guessed the truth. 

He watched her closely now, without seeming to do 
so. She was very pretty in a quiet and unusual way. 
There was something irresistibly attractive about her, 
appealing to old memories which were painted clearly 
in his heart. She was girlishly slim. He had observed 
that her eyes were beautifully clear and gray in the sun¬ 
light, and her exquisitely smooth dark hair, neatly coiled 
and luxuriant crown of beauty, reminded him of puri- 
tanism in its simplicity. At times he doubted that she 
was twenty-three. If she had said nineteen or twenty 
he would have been better satisfied. She puzzled him 
and roused speculation in him. But it was a part of his 
business to see many things which others might not 
see—and hold his tongue. 

*‘We are not quite alone// she was saying. “There 
are others,” and she made a little gesture toward two 
figures farther up the rail. 

“Old Donald Hardwick, of Skagway,” he said, 
“And the other is Alan Holt.” 

“Oh, yes.” 

She was facing the mountains again, her eyes shin¬ 
ing in the light of the moon. Gently her hand touched 
the old captain’s arm. “Listen,” she whispered. 

“Another berg breaking away from Old Thun 


THE ALASKAN 5 

der. We are very near the shore, and there are glaciers 
all the way up.” 

“And that other sound, like low wind—on a night so 
still and calm! What is it?” 

“You always hear that when very close to the big 
mountains, Miss Standish. It is made by the water of 
a thousand streams and rivulets rushing down to the 
sea. Wherever there is melting snow in the mountains, 
you hear that song.” 

“And this man, Alan Holt,” she reminded him. “He 
is a part of these things?” 

“Possibly more than any other man, Miss Standish. 
He was born in Alaska before Nome or Fairbanks or 
Dawson City were thought of. It was in Eighty-four, 
I think. Let me see, that would make him—” 

“Thirty-eight,” she said, so quickly that for a mo¬ 
ment he was astonished. 

Then he chuckled. “You are very good at figures.” 

He felt an almost imperceptible tightening of her 
fingers on his arm. 

“This evening, just after dinner, old Donald found 
me sitting alone. He said he was lonely and wanted 
to talk with someone—like me. He almost frightened 
me, with his great, gray beard and shaggy hair. I 
thought of ghosts as we talked there in the dusk.” 

“Old Donald belongs to the days when the Chilkoot 
and the White Horse ate up men’s lives, and a trail of 
living dead led from the Summit to Klondike, Miss 
Standish,” said Captain Rifle. “You will meet many 


6 


THE ALASKAN 


like him in Alaska. And they remember. You can see 
it in their faces—always the memory of those days 
that are gone.” 

She bowed her head a little, looking to the sea. “And 
Alan Holt? You know him well?” 

“Few men know him well. He is a part of Alaska 
itself, and I have sometimes thought him more aloof 
than the mountains. But I know him. All northern 
Alaska knows Alan Holt. He has a reindeer range up 
beyond the Endicott Mountains and is always seeking 
the last frontier.” 

“He must be very brave.” 

“Alaska breeds heroic men, Miss Standish.” 

“And honorable men—men you can trust and believe 
in?” 

“Yes.” 

“It is odd,” she said, with a trembling little laugh 
that was like a bird-note in her throat. “I have never 
seen Alaska before, and yet something about these 
mountains makes me feel that I have known them a 
long time ago. I seem to feel they are welcoming me 
and that I am going home. Alan Holt is a fortunate 
man. I should like to be an Alaskan.” 

“And you are—” 

“An American,” she finished for him, a sudden, 
swift irony in her voice. “A poor product out of the 
melting-pot, Captain Rifle. I am going north—to 
learn.” 

“Only that, Miss Standish?” 


THE ALASKAN 


7 

His question, quietly spoken and without emphasis, 
demanded an answer. His kindly face, seamed by the 
suns and winds of many years at sea, was filled with 
honest anxiety as she turned to look straight into his 
eyes. 

“I must press the question,” he said. “As the cap¬ 
tain of this ship, and as a father, it is my duty. Is 
there not something you would like to tell me—in con¬ 
fidence, if you will have it so?” 

For an instant she hesitated, then slowly she shook 
her head. “There is nothing, Captain Rifle.” 

“And yet—you came aboard very strangely,” he 
urged. “You will recall that it was most unusual— 
without reservation, without baggage—” 

“You forget the hand-bag,” she reminded him. 

“Yes, but one does not start for northern Alaska 
with only a hand-bag scarcely large enough to contain, 
a change of linen, Miss Standish.” 

“But I did, Captain Rifle.” 

“True. And I saw you fighting past the guards like 
a little wildcat. It was without precedent.” 

“I am sorry. But they were stupid and difficult to 
pass/" 

“Only by chance did I happen to see it all, my child. 
Otherwise the ship’s regulations would have compelled 
me to send you ashore. You were frightened. You 
can not deny that. You were running away from 
something!” 


8 


THE ALASKAN 

He was amazed at the childish simplicity with which 
she answered him. 

“Yes, I was running away—from something.” 

Her eyes were beautifully clear and unafraid, and 
yet again he sensed the thrill of the fight she was 
making. 

“And you will not tell me why—or from what you 
were escaping?” 

“I can not—tonight. I may do so before we reach 
Nome. But—it is possible—” 

“What?” 

“That I shall never reach Nome.” 

Suddenly she caught one of his hands in both her 
own. Her fingers clung to him, and with a little note of 
fierceness in her voice she hugged the hand to her 
breast. “I know just how good you have been to me,” 
she cried. “I should like to tell you why I came aboard 
—like that. But I can not. Look! Look at those won¬ 
derful mountains!” With one free hand she pointed. 

“Behind them and beyond them lie the romance and 
adventure and mystery of centuries, and for nearly 
thirty years you have been very near those things, 
Captain Rifle. No man will ever see again what you 
have seen or feel what you have felt, or forget what 
you have had to forget. I know it. And after all that, 
can’t you—won’t you—forget the strange manner in 
which I came aboard this ship? It is such a simple, 
little thing to put out of your mind, so trivial, so un- 


THE ALASKAN 9 

important when you look back—and think. Please, 
Captain Rifle—please!” 

So quickly that he scarcely sensed the happening of 
it, she pressed his hand to her lips. Their warm thrill 
came and went in an instant, leaving him speechless, 
his resolution gone. 

“I love you because you have been so good to me,” 
she whispered, and as suddenly as she had kissed his 
hand, she was gone, leaving him alone at the rail. 


CHAPTER II 


A LAN HOLT saw the slim figure of the girl sil- 
houetted against the vivid light of the open door¬ 
way of the upper-deck salon. He was not watching 
her, nor did he look closely at the exceedingly attrac¬ 
tive picture which she made as she paused there for an 
instant after leaving Captain Rifle. To him she was 
only one of the five hundred human atoms that went 
to make up the tremendously interesting life of one 
of the first ships of the season going north. Fate, 
through the suave agency of the purser, had brought 
him into a bit closer proximity to her than the others; 
that was all. For two days her seat in the dining- 
salon had been at the same table, not quite opposite 
him. As she had missed both breakfast hours, and he 
had skipped two^ luncheons, the requirements of neigh¬ 
borliness and of courtesy had not imposed more than a 
dozen words of speech upon them. This was very 
satisfactory to Alan. He was not talkative or commu¬ 
nicative of his own free will. There was a certain 
cynicism back of his love of silence. He was a good 
listener and a first-rate analyst. Some people, he knew, 
were bom to talk; and others, to trim the balance, 
were burdened with the necessity of holding their 
tongues. For him silence was not a burden. 


THE ALASKAN 


II 


In his cool and casual way he admired Mary Stan- 
dish. She was very quiet, and he liked her because of 
that. He could not, of course, escape the beauty of her 
eyes, or the shimmering luster of the long lashes that 
darkened them. But these were details which did not 
thrill him, but merely pleased him. And her hair 
pleased him possibly even more than her gray eyes, 
though he was not sufficiently concerned to discuss the 
matter with himself. But if he had pointed out any one 
thing, it would have been her hair—not so much the 
color of it as the care she evidently gave it, and the 
manner in which she dressed it. He noted that it was 
dark, with varying flashes of luster in it under the 
dinner lights. But what he approved of most of all 
were the smooth, silky coils in which she fastened it to 
her pretty head. It was an intense relief after looking 
on so many frowsy heads, bobbed and marcelled, during 
his six months’ visit in the States. So he liked her, 
generally speaking, because there was not a thing about 
her that he might dislike. 

He did not, of course, wonder what the girl might 
be thinking of him—with his quiet, stern face, his cold 
indifference, his rather Indian-like litheness, and the 
single patch of gray that streaked his thick, blond hair. 
His interest had not reached anywhere near that point. 

Tonight it was probable that no woman in the world 
could have interested him, except as the always casual 
observer of humanity. Another and greater thing 
gripped him and had thrilled him since he first felt the 


12 


THE ALASKAN 

throbbing pulse of the engines of the new steamship 
Nome under his feet at Seattle. He was going home. 
And home meant Alaska. It meant the mountains, the 
vast tundras, the immeasurable spaces into which civi¬ 
lization had not yet come with its clang and clamor. It 
meant friends, the stars he knew, his herds, everything 
he loved. Such was his reaction after six months of 
exile, six months of loneliness and desolation in cities 
which he had learned to hate. 

“I’ll not make the trip again—not for a whole 
winter—unless I’m sent at the point of a gun,” he said 
to Captain Rifle, a few moments after Mary Standish 
had left the deck. “An Eskimo winter is long enough, 
but one in Seattle, Minneapolis, Chicago, and New 
York is longer—for me.” 

“I understand they had you up before the Com¬ 
mittee on Ways and Means at Washington.” 

“Yes, along with Carl Lomen, of Nome. But Lomen 
was the real man. He has forty thousand head of 
reindeer in the Seward Peninsula, and they had to 
listen to him. We may get action.” 

“May!” Captain Rifle grunted his doubt. “Alaska 
has been waiting ten years for a new deck and a new 
deal. I doubt if you’ll get anything. When politicians 
from Iowa and south Texas tell us what we can have 
and what we need north of Fifty-eight—why, what’s 
the use? Alaska might as well shut up shop!” 

“But she isn’t going to do that,” said Alan Holt, his 
face grimly set in the moonlight. “They’ve tried hard 


THE ALASKAN 


*3 

to get us, and they’ve made us shut up a lot of our 
doors. In 1910 we were thirty-six thousand whites in 
the Territory. Since then the politicians at Washington 
have driven out nine thousand, a quarter of the popula¬ 
tion. But those that are left are hard-boiled. We’re 
not going to quit, Captain. A lot of us are Alaskans, 
and we are not afraid to fight.” 

“You mean—” 

“That we’ll have a square deal within another five 
years, or know the reason why. And another five 
years after that, we’ll be shipping a million reindeer 
carcasses down into the States each year. Within 
twenty years we’ll be shipping five million. Nice 
thought for the beef barons, eh? But rather fortunate, 
I think, for the hundred million Americans who are 
turning their grazing lands into farms and irrigation 
systems.” 

One of Alan Holt’s hands was clenched at the rail. 
“Until I went down this winter, I didn’t realize just 
how bad it was,” he said, a note hard as iron in his 
voice. “Lomen is a diplomat, but I’m not. I want to 
fight when I see such things—fight with a gun. Be¬ 
cause we happened to find gold up here, they think 
Alaska is an orange to be sucked as quickly as possible, 
and that when the sucking process is over, the skin 
will be worthless. That’s modern, dollar-chasing 
Americanism for you!” 

“And are you not an American, Mr. Holt?” 

So soft and near was the voice that both men started 


THE ALASKAN 


14 

Then both turned and stared. Close behind them, her 
quiet, beautiful face flooded with the moon-glow, stood 
Mary Standish. 

“You ask me a question, madam,” said Alan Holt, 
bowing courteously. “No, I am not an American. I 
am an Alaskan.” 

The girl’s lips were parted. Her eyes were very 
bright and clear. “Please pardon me for listening,” she 
said. “I couldn’t help it. I am an American. I love 
America. I think I love it more than anything else in 
the world—more than my religion, even. America, 
Mr. Holt. And America doesn’t necessarily mean a 
great many of America’s people. I love to think that I 
first came ashore in the Mayflower. That is why my 
name is Standish. And I just wanted to remind you 
that Alaska is America.” 

Alan Holt was a bit amazed. The girl’s face was no 
longer placidly quiet. Her eyes were radiant. He 
sensed the repressed thrill in her voice, and he knew 
that in the light of day he would have seen fire in her 
cheeks. He smiled, and in that smile he could not quite 
keep back the cynicism of his thought. 

“And what do you know about Alaska, Miss Stand¬ 
ish ?” 

“Nothing,” she said. “And yet I love it.” She 
pointed to the mountains. “I wish I might have been 
born among them. You are fortunate. You should 
love America.” 

“Alaska, you mean!” 


THE ALASKAN 


15 

“No, America.” There was a flashing challenge in 
her eyes. She was not speaking apologetically. Her 
meaning was direct. 

The irony on Alan’s lips died away. With a little 
laugh he bowed again. “If I am speaking to a daughter 
of Captain Miles Standish, who came over in the 
Mayflower, I stand reproved,” he said. “You should be 
an authority on Americanism, if I am correct in sur¬ 
mising your relationship.” 

“You are correct,” she replied with a proud, little 
tilt of her glossy head, “though I think that only lately 
have I come to an understanding of its significance— 
and its responsibility. I ask your pardon again for in¬ 
terrupting you. It was not premeditated. It just hap¬ 
pened.” 

She did not wait for either of them to speak, but 
flashed the two a swift smile and passed down the 
promenade. 

The music had ceased and the cabins at last were 
emptying themselves of life. 

“A remarkable young woman,” Alan remarked. “I 
imagine that the spirit of Captain Miles Standish may 
be a little proud of this particular olive-branch. A 
chip off the old block, you might say. One would al¬ 
most suppose he had married Priscilla and this young 
lady was a definite though rather indirect result.” 

He had a curious way of laughing without any more 
visible manifestation of humor than spoken words. It 
was a quality in his voice which one could not miss. 


1<5 


THE ALASKAN 


and at times, when ironically amused, it carried a sting 
which he did not altogether intend. 

In another moment Mary Standish was forgotten, 
and he was asking the captain a question which was 
in his mind. 

“The itinerary of this ship is rather confused, is it 
not?” 

“Yes—rather,” acknowledged Captain Rifle. “Here¬ 
after she will ply directly between Seattle and Nome. 
But this time we’re doing the Inside Passage to Juneau 
and Skagway and will make the Aleutian Passage via 
Cordova and Seward. A whim of the owners, which 
they haven’t seen fit to explain to me. Possibly the 
Canadian junket aboard may have something to do 
with it. We’re landing them at Skagway, where they 
make the Yukon by way of White Horse Pass. A 
pleasure trip for flabby people nowadays, Holt. I can 
remember—” 

“So can I,” nodded Alan Holt, looking at the moun¬ 
tains beyond which lay the dead-strewn trails of the 
gold stampede of a generation before. “I remember. 
And old Donald is dreaming of that hell of death back 
there. He was all choked up tonight. I wish he might 
forget.” 

“Men don’t forget such women as Jane Hope,” said 
the captain softly. 

“You knew her?” 

“Yes. She came up with her father on my ship. That 
was twenty-five years ago last autumn, Alan. A long 


THE ALASKAN i? 

time, isn't it? And when I look at Mary Standish and 
hear her voice—” He hesitated, as if betraying a 
secret, and then he added: “—I can’t help thinking of 
the girl Donald Hardwick fought for and won in that 
death-hole at White Horse. It’s too bad she had to 
die.” 

“She isn’t dead,” said Alan. The hardness was gone 
from his voice. “She isn’t dead,” he repeated. “That’s 
the pity of it. She is as much a living thing to him 
today as she was twenty years ago.” 

After a moment the captain said, “She was talking 
with him early this evening, Alan.” 

“Miss Captain Miles Standish, you mean?” 

“Yes. There seems to be something about her that 
amuses you.” 

Alan shrugged his shoulders. “Not at all. I think 
she is a most admirable young person. Will you have a 
cigar, Captain ? I’m going to promenade a bit. It does 
me good to mix in with the sour-doughs.” 

The two lighted their cigars from a single match, 
and Alan went his way, while the captain turned in 
the direction of his cabin. 

To Alan, on this particular night, the steamship 
Nome was more than a thing of wood and steel. It was 
a living, pulsating being, throbbing with the very heart¬ 
beat of Alaska. The purr of the mighty engines was 
a human intelligence crooning a song of joy. For him 
the crowded passenger list held a significance that was 
almost epic, and its names represented more than mere 


18 THE ALASKAN 

men and women. They were the vital fiber of the land 
he loved, its heart’s blood, its very element—“giving 
in.” He knew that with the throb of those engines ro¬ 
mance, adventure, tragedy, and hope were on their way 
north—and with these things also arrogance and greed. 
On board were a hundred conflicting elements—some 
that had fought for Alaska, others that would make 
her, and others that would destroy. 

He puffed at his cigar and walked alone, brushing 
sleeves with men and women whom he scarcely seemed 
to notice. But he was observant. He knew the tourists 
almost without looking at them. The spirit of the 
north had not yet seized upon them. They were voluble 
and rather excitedly enthusiastic in the face of beauty 
and awesomeness. The sour-doughs were tucked away 
here and there in shadowy nooks, watching in silence, 
or they walked the deck slowly and quietly, smoking 
their cigars or pipes, and seeing things beyond the 
mountains. Between these two, the newcomers and the 
old-timers, ran the gamut of all human thrill for Alan, 
the flesh-and-blood fiber of everything that went to 
make up life north of Fifty-four. And he could have 
gone from man to man and picked out those who be¬ 
longed north of Fifty-eight. 

Aft of the smoking-room he paused, tipping the ash 
of his cigar over the edge of the rail. A little group 
of three stood near him, and he recognized them 
as the young engineers, fresh from college, going up to 
work on the government railroad running from Sew- 


THE ALASKAN 19 

ard to Tanana. One of them was talking, filled with 
the enthusiasm of his first adventure. 

“I tell you,” he said, “people don’t know what they 
ought to know about Alaska. In school they teach us 
that it’s an eternal icebox full of gold, and is head' 
quarters for Santa Claus, because that’s where rein¬ 
deer come from. And grown-ups think about the same 
thing. Why”—he drew in a deep breath—“it’s nine 
times as large as the state of Washington, twelve times 
as big as the state of New York, and we bought it 
from Russia for less than two cents an acre. If you 
put it down on the face of the United States, the city 
of Juneau would be in St Augustine, Florida, and 
Unalaska would be in Los Angeles. That’s how big it 
is, and the geographical center of our country isn’t 
Omaha or Sioux City, but exactly San Francisco, 
California.” 

“Good for you, sonny,” came a quiet voice from be¬ 
yond the group. “Your geography is correct. And you 
might add for the education of your people that Alaska 
is only thirty-seven miles from Bolshevik Siberia, and 
wireless messages are sent into Alaska by the Bolshe¬ 
viks urging our people to rise against the Washington 
government. We’ve asked Washington for a few guns 
and a few men to guard Nome, but they laugh at us. 
Do you see a moral?” 

From half-amused interest Alan jerked himself to 
alert tension. He caught a glimpse of the gaunt, old 
graybeard who had spoken, but did not know him. And 


20 


THE ALASKAN 


as this man turned away, a shadowy hulk in the moon¬ 
light, the same deep, quiet voice came back very clearly: 

“And if you ever care for Alaska, you might tell 
your government to hang a few such men as John 
Graham, sonny.” 

At the sound of that name Alan felt the blood in 
him run suddenly hot. Only one man on the face of 
the earth did he hate with undying hatred, and that 
man was John Graham. He would have followed, 
seeking the identity of the stranger whose words had 
temporarily stunned the young engineers, when he saw 
a slim figure standing between him and the light of the 
smoking-room windows. It was Mary Standish. He 
knew by her attitude that she had heard the words of 
the young engineer and the old graybeard, but she 
was looking at him. And he could not remember that 
he had ever seen quite that same look in a woman’s 
face before. It was not fright. It was more an ex¬ 
pression of horror which comes from thought and 
mental vision rather than physical things. Instantly it 
annoyed Alan Holt. This was the second time she had 
betrayed a too susceptible reaction in matters which 
did not concern her. So he said, speaking to the silent 
young men a few steps away: 

“He was mistaken, gentlemen. John Graham should 
not be hung. That would be too merciful.” 

He resumed his way then, nodding at them as he 
passed. But he had scarcely gone out of their vision 


THE ALASKAN 


21 


when quick footsteps pattered behind him, and the 
girl’s hand touched his arm lightly. 

“Mr. Holt, please—” 

He stopped, sensing the fact that the soft pressure 
of her fingers was not altogether unpleasant. She hesi¬ 
tated, and when she spoke again, only her finger-tips 
touched his arm. She was looking shoreward, so that 
for a moment he could see only the lustrous richness 
of her smooth hair. Then she was meeting his eyes 
squarely, a flash of challenge in the gray depths of her 
own. 

“I am alone on the ship,” she said. “I have no 
friends here. I want to see things and ask questions. 
Will you . . . help me a little ?” 

“You mean . . . escort you?” 

“Yes, if you will. I should feel more comfortable.” 

Nettled at first, the humor of the situation began to 
appeal to him, and he wondered at the intense serious¬ 
ness of the girl. She did not smile. Her eyes were very 
steady and very businesslike, and at the same time 
very lovely. 

“The way you put it, I don’t see how I can refuse,” 
he said. “As for the questions—probably Captain Rifle 
can answer them better than I.” 

“I don’t like to trouble him,” she replied. “He has 
much to think about. And you are alone.” 

“Yes, quite alone. And with very little to think 
about.” 

“You know what I mean, Mr. Holt. Possibly you 


22 


THE ALASKAN 


can not understand me, or won’t try. But I’m going 
into a new country, and I have a passionate desire to 
learn as much about that country as I can before I get 
there. I want to know about many things. For in¬ 
stance—” 

“Yes.” 

“Why did you say what you did about John Gra¬ 
ham? What did the other man mean when he said he 
should be hung?” 

There was an intense directness in her question 
which for a moment astonished him. She had with¬ 
drawn her fingers from his arm, and her slim figure 
seemed possessed of a sudden throbbing suspense as 
she waited for an answer. They had turned a little, so 
that in the light of the moon the almost flowerlike 
whiteness of her face was clear to him. With her 
smooth, shining hair, the pallor of her face under its 
lustrous darkness, and the clearness of her eyes she 
held Alan speechless for a moment, while his brain 
struggled to seize upon and understand the something 
about her which made him interested in spite of him¬ 
self. Then he smiled and there was a sudden glitter in 
his eyes. 

“Did you ever see a dog fight ?” he asked. 

She hesitated, as if trying to remember, and shud¬ 
dered slightly. “Once.” 

“What happened?” 

“It was my dog—a little dog. His throat was 
torn—” 


THE ALASKAN 


23 

He nodded. “Exactly. And that is just what John 
Graham is doing to Alaska, Miss Standish. He’s the 
dog—a monster. Imagine a man with a colossal 
financial power behind him, setting out to strip the 
wealth from a new land and enslave it to his own 
desires and political ambitions. That is what John 
Graham is doing from his money-throne down there in 
the States. It’s the financial support he represents, 
curse him! Money—and a man without conscience. A 
man who would starve thousands or millions to achieve 
his ends. A man who, in every sense of the word, is 
a murderer—” 

The sharpness of her cry stopped him. If possible, 
her face had gone whiter, and he saw her hands 
clutched suddenly at her breast. And the look in her 
eyes brought the old, cynical twist back to his lips. 

“There, I’ve hurt your puritanism again, Miss 
Standish,” he said, bowing a little. “In order to appeal 
to your finer sensibilities I suppose I must apologize 
for swearing and calling another man a murderer. 
Well, I do. And now—if you care to stroll about the 
ship—” 

From a respectful distance the three young engineers 
watched Alan and Mary Standish as they walked for¬ 
ward. 

“A corking pretty girl,” said one of them, drawing 
a deep breath. “I never saw such hair and eyes—” 

“I’m at the same table with them,” interrupted 
another. “I’m second on her left, and she hasn’t spoken 


THE ALASKAN 


24 

three words to me. And that fellow she is with is like 
an icicle out of Labrador.” 

And Mary Standish was saying: “Do you know, 
Mr. Holt, I envy those young engineers. I wish I were 
a man.” 

‘‘I wish you were,” agreed Alan amiably. 
Whereupon Mary Standish’s pretty mouth lost its 
softness for an instant. But Alan did not observe this. 
He was enjoying his cigar and the sweet air. 


CHAPTER III 


A LAN HOLT was a man whom other men looked at 
twice. With women it was different. He was, in 
no solitary sense of the word, a woman’s man. He ad¬ 
mired them in an abstract way, and he was ready to 
fight for them, or die for them, at any time such a 
course became necessary. But his sentiment was en¬ 
tirely a matter of common sense. His chivalry was 
born and bred of the mountains and the open and had 
nothing in common with the insincere brand which de¬ 
velops in the softer and more luxurious laps of civi¬ 
lization. Years of aloneness had put their mark upon 
him. Men of the north, reading the lines, understood 
what they meant. But only now and then could a 
woman possibly understand. Yet if in any given mo¬ 
ment a supreme physical crisis had come, women would 
have turned instinctively in their helplessness to such 
a man as Alan Holt. 

He possessed a vein of humor which few had been 
privileged to discover. The mountains had taught him 
to laugh in silence. With him a chuckle meant as much 
as a riotous outburst of merriment from another, and 
he could enjoy greatly without any noticeable muscular 
disturbance of his face. And not always was his smile 
25 


26 THE ALASKAN 

a reflection of humorous thought. There were times 
when it betrayed another kind of thought more force¬ 
fully than speech. 

Because he understood fairly well and knew what he 
was, the present situation amused him. He could not 
but see what an error in judgment Miss Standish had 
made in selecting him, when compared with the in¬ 
toxicating thrill she could easily have aroused by 
choosing one of the young engineers as a companion in 
her evening adventure. He chuckled. And Mary 
Standish, hearing the smothered note of amusement, 
gave to her head that swift little birdlike tilt which 
he had observed once before, in the presence of Cap¬ 
tain Rifle. But she said nothing. As if challenged, she 
calmly took possession of his arm. 

Halfway round the deck, Alan began to sense the 
fact that there was a decidedly pleasant flavor to the 
whole thing. The girl’s hand did not merely touch his 
arm; it was snuggled there confidently, and she was 
necessarily so close to him that when he looked down, 
the glossy coils of her hair were within a few inches 
of his face. His nearness to her, together with the soft 
pressure of her hand on his arm, was a jolt to his 
stoicism. 

“It’s not half bad,” he expressed himself frankly. 
“I really believe I am going to enjoy answering your 
questions, Miss Standish.” 

“Oh!” He felt the slim, little figure stiffen for an 


THE ALASKAN 


27 

instant. “You thought—possibly—I might be danger¬ 
ous?” 

“A little. I don’t understand women. Collectively 
I think they are God’s most wonderful handiwork. 
Individually I don’t care much about them. But you—” 

She nodded approvingly. “That is very nice of you. 
But you needn’t say I am different from the others. I 
am not. All women are alike.” 

“Possibly—except in the way they dress their hair.” 

“You like mine?” 

“Very much.” 

He was amazed at the admission, so much so that he 
puffed out a huge cloud of smoke from his cigar in 
mental protest. 

They had come to the smoking-room again. This 
was an innovation aboard the Nome. There was no 
other like it in the Alaskan service, with its luxurious 
space, its comfortable hospitality, and the observation 
parlor built at one end for those ladies who cared to 
sit with their husbands while they smoked their after- 
dinner cigars. 

“If you want to hear about Alaska and see some of 
its human make-up, let’s go in,” he suggested. “I know 
of no better place. Are you afraid of smoke ?” 

“No. If I were a man, I would smoke.” 

“Perhaps you do?” 

“I do not. When I begin that, if you please, I shall 
bob my hair.” 


28 


THE ALASKAN 

“Which would be a crime,” he replied so earnestly 
that again he was surprised at himself. 

Two or three ladies, with their escorts, were in the 
parlor when they entered. The huge main room, cover¬ 
ing a third of the aft deck, was blue with smoke. A 
score of men were playing cards at round tables. Twice 
as many were gathered in groups, talking, while others 
walked aimlessly up and down the carpeted floor. Here 
and there were men who sat alone. A few were asleep, 
which made Alan look at his watch. Then he observed 
Mary Standish studying the innumerable bundles of 
neatly rolled blankets that lay about. One of them 
was at her feet. She touched it with her toe. 

“What do they mean?” she asked. 

“We are overloaded,” he explained. “Alaskan steam¬ 
ships have no steerage passengers as we generally know 
them. It isn’t poverty that rides steerage when you go 
north. You can always find a millionaire or two on 
the lower deck. When they get sleepy, most of the 
men you see in there will unroll blankets and sleep on 
the floor. Did you ever see an earl?” 

He felt it his duty to make explanations now that 
he had brought her in, and directed her attention to 
the third table on their left. Three men were seated at 
this table. 

“The man facing us, the one with a flabby face and 
pale mustache, is an earl—I forget his name,” he said. 
“He doesn’t look it, but he is a real sport. He is going 
up to shoot Kadiak bears, and sleeps on the floor. The 


THE ALASKAN 


29 

group beyond them, at the fifth table, are Treadwell 
mining men, and that fellow you see slouched against 
the wall, half asleep, with whiskers nearly to his waist, 
is Stampede Smith, an old-time partner of George 
Carmack, who discovered gold on Bonanza Creek in 
Ninety-six. The thud of Carmack’s spade, as it hit 
first pay, was the ‘sound heard round the world/ Miss 
Standish. And the gentleman with crumpled whiskers 
was the second-best man at Bonanza, excepting Skook- 
um Jim and Taglish Charlie, two Siwah Indians who 
were with Carmack when the strike was made. Also, 
if you care for the romantic, he was in love with 
Belinda Mulrooney, the most courageous woman who 
ever came into the north/’ 

“Why was she courageous ?” 

“Because she came alone into a man’s land, without 
a soul to fight for her, determined to make a fortune 
along with the others. And she did. As long as there 
is a Dawson sour-dough alive, he will remember Be¬ 
linda Mulrooney.” 

“She proved what a woman could do, Mr. Holt.” 

“Yes, and a little later she proved how foolish a 
woman can be, Miss Standish. She became the richest 
woman in Dawson. Then came a man who posed as a 
count, Belinda married him, and they went to Paris. 
Finis, I think. Now, if she had married Stampede 
Smith over there, with his big whiskers—” 

He did not finish. Half a dozen paces from them a 
man had risen from a table and was facing them. 


3 o THE ALASKAN 

There was nothing unusual about him, except his bold¬ 
ness as he looked at Mary Standish. It was as if he 
knew her and was deliberately insulting her in a stare 
that was more than impudent in its directness. Then 
a sudden twist came to his lips; he shrugged his shoul¬ 
ders slightly and turned away. 

Alan glanced swiftly at his companion. Her lips 
were compressed, and her cheeks were flaming hotly. 
Even then, as his own blood boiled, he could not but 
observe how beautiful anger made her. 

“If you will pardon me a moment,” he said quietly, 
“I shall demand an explanation.” 

Her hand linked itself quickly through his arm. 

“Please don’t,” she entreated. “It is kind of yoUj 
and you are just the sort of man I should expect to 
resent a thing like that. But it would be absurd to 
notice it. Don’t you think so?” 

In spite of her effort to speak calmly, there was a 
tremble in her voice, and Alan was puzzled at the 
quickness with which the color went from her face, 
leaving it strangely white. 

“I am at your service,” he replied with a rather cold 
inclination of his head. “But if you were my sister, 
Miss Standish, I would not allow anything like that to 
go unchallenged.” 

He watched the stranger until he disappeared 
through a door out upon the deck. 

“One of John Graham’s men,” he said. “A fellow 
named Rossland, going up to get a final grip on the 


THE ALASKAN 


3 * 

salmon fishing, I understand. They’ll choke the life out 
of it in another two years. Funny what this filthy 
stuff we call money can do, isn’t it? Two winters ago 
I saw whole Indian villages starving, and women and 
little children dying by the score because of this John 
Graham’s money. Over-fishing did it, you understand. 
If you could have seen some of those poor little devils, 
just skin and bones, crying for a rag to eat—” 

Her hand clutched at his arm. “How could John 
Graham—do that?” she whispered. 

He laughed unpleasantly. “When you have been a 
year in Alaska you won’t ask that question, Miss 
Standish. Howf Why, simply by glutting his can¬ 
neries and taking from the streams the food supply 
which the natives have depended upon for generations. 
In other words, the money he handles represents the 
fish trust—and many other things. Please don’t mis¬ 
understand me. Alaska needs capital for its develop¬ 
ment. Without it we will not only cease to progress; 
we will die. No territory on the face of the earth offers 
greater opportunities for capital than Alaska does 
today. Ten thousand fortunes are waiting to be made 
here by men who have money to invest. 

“But John Graham does not represent the type we 
want. He is a despoiler, one of those whose only de¬ 
sire is to turn original resource into dollars as fast as 
he can, even though those operations make both land 
and water barren. You must remember until recently 
the government of Alaska as manipulated by Washing- 


32 


THE ALASKAN 

ton politicians was little better than that against which 
the American colonies rebelled in 1 77 ^* ^ hard thing 
for one to say about the country he loves, isnt it? 
And John Graham stands for the worst—he and the 
money which guarantees his power. 

“As a matter of fact, big and legitimate capital 
is fighting shy of Alaska. Conditions are such, thanks 
to red-tapeism and bad politics, that capital, big and 
little, looks askance at Alaska and cannot be interested. 
Think of it, Miss Standish! There are thirty-eight 
separate bureaus at Washington operating on Alaska, 
five, thousand miles away. Is it a wonder the patient 
is sick? And is it a wonder that-a man like John 
Graham, dishonest and corrupt to the soul, has a fertile 
field to work in ? 

“But we are progressing. We are slowly coming 
out from under the shadow which has so long clouded 
Alaska’s interests. There is now a growing concen¬ 
tration of authority and responsibility. Both the De¬ 
partment of the Interior and the Department of Agri¬ 
culture now realize that Alaska is a mighty empire in 
itself, and with their help we are bound to go ahead 
in spite of all our handicaps. It is men like John 
Graham I fear. Some day—” 

Suddenly he caught himself. “There—I’m talking 
politics, and I should entertain you with pleasanter and 
more interesting things,” he apologized. “Shall we go 
to the lower decks?” 


THE ALASKAN 33 

“Or the open air,” she suggested. “I am afraid this 
smoke is upsetting me.” 

He could feel the change in her and did not attrib¬ 
ute it entirely to the thickness of the air. Rossland’s 
inexplicable rudeness had disturbed her more deeply 
than she had admitted, he believed. 

“There are a number of Thlinkit Indians and a 
tame bear down in what we should ordinarily call the 
steerage. Would you like to see them?” he asked, when 
they were outside. “The Thlinkit girls are the prettiest 
Indian women in the world, and there are two among 
those below who are—well—unusually good-looking, 
the Captain says.” 

“And he has already made me acquainted with 
them,” she laughed softly. “Kolo and Haidah are the 
girls. They are sweet, and I love them. I had break¬ 
fast with them this morning long before you were 
awake.” 

“The deuce you say! And that is why you were not 
at table ? And the morning before—” 

“You noticed my absence?” she asked demurely. 

“It was difficult for me not to see an empty chair. 
On second thought, I think the young engineer called 
my attention to it by wondering if you were ill.” 
“Oh!” 

“He is very much interested in you, Miss Standish. 
It amuses me to see him torture the comers of his 
eyes to look at you. I have thought it would be only 
charity and good-will to change seats with him.” 


34 THE ALASKAN 

“In which event, of course, your eyes would not 
suffer.” 

“Probably not ” 

“Have they ever suffered ?” 

“I think not.” 

“When looking at the Thlinkit girls, for instance?” 

“I haven’t seen them.” 

She gave her shoulders a little shrug. 

“Ordinarily I would think you most uninteresting, 
Mr. Holt. As it is I think you unusual. And I rather 
like you for it. Would you mind taking me to my 
cabin? It is number sixteen, on this deck.” 

She walked with her fingers touching his arm again. 
“What is your room?” she asked. 

“Twenty-seven, Miss Standish.” 

“This deck?” 

“Yes.” 

Not until she had said good night, quietly and with¬ 
out offering him her hand, did the intimacy of her last 
questions strike him. He grunted and lighted a fresh 
cigar. A number of things occurred to him all at once, 
as he slowly made a final round or two of the deck. 
Then he went to his cabin and looked over papers 
which were going ashore at Juneau. These were 
memoranda giving an account of his appearance with 
‘Carl Lomen before the Ways and Means Committee 
at Washington. 

It was nearly midnight when he had finished. He 
wondered if Mary Standish was asleep. He was a little 


THE ALASKAN 


35 

irritated, and slightly amused, by the recurring insis¬ 
tency with which his mind turned to her. She was a 
clever girl, he admitted. He had asked her nothing 
about herself, and she had told him nothing, while he 
had been quite garrulous. He was a little ashamed 
when he recalled how he had unburdened his mind to a 
girl who could not possibly be interested in the political 
affairs of John Graham and Alaska. Well, it was not 
entirely his fault. She had fairly catapulted ‘herself 
upon him, and he had been decent under the circum¬ 
stances, he thought. 

He put out his light and stood with his face at the 
open port-hole. Only the soft throbbing of the vessel 
as she made her way slowly through the last of the 
Narrows into Frederick Sound came to his ears. The 
ship, at last, was asleep. The moon was straight over¬ 
head, no longer silhouetting the mountains, and beyond 
its misty rim of light the world was dark. Out of this 
darkness, rising like a deeper shadow, Alan could make 
out faintly the huge mass of Kupreanof Island. And 
he wondered, knowing the perils of the Narrows in 
places scarcely wider than the length of the ship, why 
Captain Rifle had chosen this course instead of going 
around by Cape Decision. He could feel that the land 
was more distant now, but the Nome was still pushing 
ahead under slow bell, and he could smell the fresh 
odor of kelp, and breathe deeply of the scent of forests 
that came from both east and west. 

Suddenly his ears became attentive to slowly ap- 


THE ALASKAN 


3<5 

proaching footsteps. They seemed to hesitate and then 
advanced; he heard a subdued voice, a man's voice— 
and in answer to it a woman’s. Instinctively he drew a 
step back and stood unseen in the gloom. There was 
no longer a sound of voices. In silence they walked 
past his window, clearly revealed to him in the moon¬ 
light. One of the two was Mary Standish. The man 
was Rossland, who had stared at her so boldly in ^he 
smoking-room. 

Amazement gripped Alan. He switched on his light 
and made his final arrangements for bed. He had no 
inclination to spy upon either Mary Standish or Gra* 1 
ham’s agent, but he possessed an inborn hatred of 
fraud and humbug, and what he had seen convinced 
him that Mary Standish knew more about Rossland 
than she had allowed him to believe. She had not lied 
to him. She had said nothing at all—except to re¬ 
strain him from demanding an apology. Evidently she 
had taken advantage of him, but beyond that fact her 
affairs had nothing to do with his own business in life. 
Possibly she and Rossland had quarreled, and now they 
were making up. Quite probable, he thought. Silly of 
him to think over the matter at all. 

So he put out his light again and went to bed. But 
he had no great desire to sleep. It was pleasant to lie 
there, flat on his back, with the soothing movement of 
the ship under him, listening to the musical thrum of it. 
And it was pleasant to think of the fact that he was 


THE ALASKAN 37 

going home. How infernally long those seven months 
had been, down in the States! And how he had missed 
everyone he had ever known—even his enemies! 

He closed his eyes and visualized the home that was 
still thousands of miles away—the endless tundras, the 
blue and purple foothills of the Endicott Mountains, 
and “Alan’s Range” at the beginning of them. Spring 
was breaking up there, and it was warm on the tundras 
and the southern slopes, and the pussy-willow buds 
were popping out of their coats like corn from a 
hopper. 

He prayed God the months had been kind to his 
people—the people of the range. It was a long time to 
be away from them, when one loved them as he did. 
He was sure that Tautuk and Amuk Toolik, his two 
chief herdsmen, would care for things as well as him¬ 
self. But much could happen in seven months. Nawad- 
look, the little beauty of his distant kingdom, was not 
looking well when he left. He was worried about her. 
The pneumonia of the previous winters had left its 
mark. And Keok, her rival in prettiness! He smiled 
in the darkness, wondering how Tautuk’s sometimes 
hopeless love affair had progressed. For Keok was a 
little heart-breaker and had long reveled in Tautuk’s 
sufferings. An archangel of iniquity, Alan thought, as 
he grinned—but worth any man’s risk of life, if he had 
but a drop of brown blood in him! As for his herds, 
they had undoubtedly fared well. Ten thousand hea<J 
was something to be proud of—* 


THE ALASKAN 


38 

Suddenly he drew in his breath and listened. Some¬ 
one was at his door and had paused there. Twice he 
had heard footsteps outside, but each time they had 
passed. He sat up, and the springs of his berth made 
a sound under him. He heard movement then, a swift, 
running movement—and he switched on his light. A 
moment later he opened the door. No one was there. 
The long corridor was empty. And then—a distance 
away—he heard the soft opening and closing of 
another door. 

It was then that his eyes saw a white, crumpled ob¬ 
ject on the floor. He picked it up and reentered his 
room. It was a woman’s handkerchief. And he had 
seen it before. He had admired the pretty laciness of 
it that evening in the smoking-room. Rather curious, 
he thought, that he should now find it at his door. 


CHAPTER IV 


F OR a few minutes after finding the handkerchief at 
his door, Alan experienced a feeling of mingled 
curiosity and disappointment—also a certain resent¬ 
ment. The suspicion that he was becoming involved in 
spite of himself was not altogether pleasant. The eve¬ 
ning, up to a certain point, had been fairly entertaining. 
It was true he might have passed a pleasanter hour re¬ 
calling old times with Stampede Smith, or discussing 
Kadiak bears with the English earl, or striking up an 
acquaintance with the unknown graybeard who had 
voiced an opinion about John Graham. But he was 
not regretting lost hours, nor was he holding Mary 
Standish accountable for them. It was, last of all, 
the handkerchief that momentarily upset him. 

Why had she dropped it at his door? It was not a 
dangerous-looking affair, to be sure, with its filmy lace 
edging and ridiculous diminutiveness. As the question 
came to him, he was wondering how even as dainty a 
nose as that possessed by Mary Standish could be much 
comforted by it. But it was pretty. And, like Mary 
Standish, there was something exquisitely quiet and 
perfect about it, like the simplicity of her hair. He was 
not analyzing the matter. It was a thought that came 
to him almost unconsciously, as he tossed the annoying 
39 


4 o THE ALASKAN 

bit of fabric on the little table at the head of his berth. 
Undoubtedly the dropping of it had been entirely un¬ 
premeditated and accidental. At least he told himself 
so. And he also assured himself, with an involuntary 
shrug of his shoulders, that any woman or girl had the 
right to pass his door if she so desired, and that he was 
an idiot for thinking otherwise. The argument was 
only slightly adequate. But Alan was not interested 
in mysteries, especially when they had to do with 
woman—and such an absurdly inconsequential thing as 
a handkerchief. 

A second time he went to bed. He fell asleep think¬ 
ing about Keok and Nawadlook and the people of his 
range. From somewhere he had been given the price¬ 
less heritage of dreaming pleasantly, and Keok was very 
real, with her swift smile and mischievous face, and 
Nawadlook’s big, soft eyes were brighter than when he 
had gone away. He saw Tautuk, gloomy as usual over 
the heartlessness of Keok. He was beating a tom-tom 
that gave out the peculiar sound of bells, and to this 
Amuk Toolik was dancing the Bear Dance, while Keok 
clapped her hands in exaggerated admiration. Even in 
his dreams Alan chuckled. He knew what was hap¬ 
pening, and that out of the corners of her laughing 
eyes Keok was enjoying Tautuk’s jealousy. Tautuk 
was so stupid he would never understand. That was 
the funny part of it. And he beat his drum savagely, 
scowling so that he almost shut his eyes, while Keok 
laughed outright. 


THE ALASKAN 


4i 

It was then that Alan opened his eyes and heard the 
last of the ship’s bells. It was still dark. He turned 
on the light and looked at his watch. Tautuk’s drum 
had tolled eight bells, aboard the ship, and it was four 
o’clock in the morning. 

Through the open port came the smell of sea and 
land, and with it a chill air which Alan drank in deeply 
as he stretched himself for a few minutes after awaken¬ 
ing. The tang of it was like wine in his blood, and 
he got up quietly and dressed while he smoked the 
stub-end of a cigar he had laid aside at midnight. Not 
until he had finished dressing did he notice the hand¬ 
kerchief on the table. If its presence had suggested a 
significance a few hours before, he no longer disturbed 
himself by thinking about it. A bit of carelessness on 
the girl’s part, that was all. He would return it. 
Mechanically he put the crumpled bit of cambric in his 
coat pocket before going on deck. 

He had guessed that he would be alone. The prom¬ 
enade was deserted. Through the ghost-white mist of 
morning he saw the rows of empty chairs, and lights 
burning dully in the wheel-house. Asian monsoon and 
the drifting warmth of the Japan current had brought 
an early spring to the Alexander Archipelago, and May 
had stolen much of the flowering softness of June. 
But the dawns of these days were chilly and gray. 
Mists and fogs settled in the valleys, and like thin smoke 
rolled down the sides of the mountains to the sea, so 


42 THE ALASKAN 

that a ship traveling the inner waters felt its way like 
a child creeping in darkness. 

Alan loved this idiosyncrasy of the Alaskan coast. 
The phantom mystery of it was stimulating, and in the 
peril of it was a challenging lure. He could feel the care 
with which the Nome was picking her way northward. 
Her engines were thrumming softly, and her movement 
was a slow and cautious glide, catlike and slightly 
trembling, as if every pound of steel in her were a liv¬ 
ing nerve widely alert. He knew Captain Rifle would 
not be asleep and that straining eyes were peering into 
the white gloom from the wheel-house. Somewhere 
west of them, hazardously near, must lie the rocks of 
Admiralty Island; eastward were the still more pitiless 
glacial sandstones and granites of the coast, with that 
deadly finger of sea-washed reef between, along the lip 
of which they must creep to Juneau. And Juneau 
could not be far ahead. 

He leaned over the rail, puffing at the stub of his 
cigar. He was eager for his work. Juneau, Skagway, 
and Cordova meant nothing to him, except that they 
were Alaska. He yearned for the still farther north, 
the wide tundras, and the mighty achievement that lay 
ahead of him there. His blood sang to the surety of it 
now, and for that reason he was not sorry he had spent 
seven months of loneliness in the States. He had 
proved with his own eyes that the day was near when 
Alaska would come into her own. Gold! He laughed. 
Gold had its lure, its romance, its thrill, but what was 


THE ALASKAN 43 

all the gold the mountains might possess compared 
with this greater thing he was helping to build! It 
seemed to him the people he had met in the south had 
thought only of gold when they learned he was from 
Alaska. Always gold—that first, and then ice, snow, 
endless nights, desolate barrens, and craggy moun¬ 
tains frowning everlastingly upon a blasted land in 
which men fought against odds and only the fittest sur¬ 
vived. It was gold that had been Alaska’s doom. 
When people thought of it, they visioned nothing be¬ 
yond the old stampede days, the Chilkoot, White 
Horse, Dawson, and Circle City. Romance and 
glamor and the tragedies of dead men clung to their 
ribs. But they were beginning to believe now. Their 
eyes were opening. Even the Government was wak¬ 
ing up, after proving there was something besides graft 
in railroad building north of Mount St. Elias. Sena¬ 
tors and Congressmen at Washington had listened to 
him seriously, and especially to Carl Lomen. And the 
beef barons, wisest of all, had tried to buy him off and 
had offered a fortune for Lomen’s forty thousand 
head of reindeer in the Seward Peninsula! That was 
proof of the awakening. Absolute proof. 

He lighted a fresh cigar, and his mind shot through 
the dissolving mist into the vast land ahead of him. 
Some Alaskans had cursed Theodore Roosevelt for put¬ 
ting what they called “the conservation shackles” on 
their country. But he, for one, did not. Roosevelt’s 
far-sightedness had kept the body-snatchers at bay, and 


44 THE ALASKAN 

because be had foreseen what money-power and greed 
would do, Alaska was not entirely stripped today, but 
lay ready to serve with all her mighty resources the 
mother who had neglected her for a generation. But 
it was going to be a struggle, this opening up of a great 
land. It must be done resourcefully and with intelli¬ 
gence. Once the bars were down, Roosevelt’s shadow- 
hand could not hold back such desecrating forces as 
John Graham and the syndicate he represented. 

Thought of Graham was an unpleasant reminder, 
and his face grew hard in the sea-mist. Alaskans 
themselves must fight against the licensed plunderers. 
And it would be a hard fight. He had seen the pillag¬ 
ing work of these financial brigands in a dozen states 
during the past winter—states raped of their forests, 
their lakes and streams robbed and polluted, their re¬ 
sources hewn down to naked skeletons. He had been 
horrified and a little frightened when he looked over 
the desolation of Michigan, once the richest timber state 
in America. What if the Government at Washington 
made it possible for such a thing to happen in Alaska ? 
Politics—and money—were already fighting for just 
that thing. 

He no longer heard the throb of the ship under his 
feet. It was his fight, and brain and muscle reacted 
to it almost as if it had been a physical thing. And his 
end of that fight he was determined to win, if it took 
every year of his life. He, with a few others, would 
prove to the world that the millions of acres of tree- 


THE ALASKAN 


43 

less tundras of the north were not the cast-off ends 
of the earth. They would populate them, and the 
so-called “barrens” would thunder to the innumerable 
hoofs of reindeer herds as the American plains had 
never thundered to the beat of cattle. He was not 
thinking of the treasure he would find at the end of 
this rainbow of success which he visioned. Money, 
simply as money, he hated. It was the achievement of 
the thing that gripped him; the passion to hew a trail 
through which his beloved land might come into its 
own, and the desire to see it achieve a final triumph by 
feeding a half of that America which had laughed at 
it and kicked it when it was down. 

The tolling of the ship’s bell roused him from the 
subconscious struggle into which he had allowed him¬ 
self to be drawn. Ordinarily he had no sympathy with 
himself when he fell into one of these mental spasms, 
as he called them. Without knowing it, he was a little 
proud of a certain dispassionate tolerance which he pos¬ 
sessed—a philosophical mastery of his emotions which 
at times was almost cold-blooded, and which made some 
people think he was a thing of stone instead of flesh 
and blood. His thrills he kept to himself. And a 
mildly disturbing sensation passed through him now, 
when he found that unconsciously his fingers had 
twined themselves about the little handkerchief in his 
pocket. He drew it out and made a sudden movement 
as if to toss it overboard. Then, with a grunt ex¬ 
pressive of the absurdity of the thing, he replaced it 


4 6 THE ALASKAN 

in his pocket and began to walk slowly toward the bow 

of the ship. 

He wondered, as he noted the lifting of the fog, what 
he would have been had he possessed a sister like Mary 
Standish. Or any family at all, for that matter—even 
an uncle or two who might have been interested in him. 
He remembered his father vividly, his mother a little 
less so, because his mother had died when he was six 
and his father when he was twenty. It was his father 
who stood out above everything else, like the moun¬ 
tains he loved. The father would remain with him 
always, inspiring him, urging him, encouraging him 
to live like a gentleman, fight like a man, and die at 
last unafraid. In that fashion the older Alan Holt had 
lived and died. But his mother, her face and voice 
scarcely remembered in the passing of many years, was 
more a hallowed memory to him than a thing of flesh 
and blood. And there had been no sisters or brothers. 
Often he had regretted this lack of brotherhood. But 
a sister. ... He grunted his disapprobation of the 
thought. A sister would have meant enchainment to 
civilization. Cities, probably. Even the States. And 
slavery to a life he detested. He appreciated the im¬ 
mensity of his freedom. A Mary Standish, even 
though she were his sister, would be a catastrophe. He 
could not conceive of her, or any other woman like 
her, living with Keok and Nawadlook and the rest of 
his people in the heart of the tundras. And the tundras 


THE ALASKAN 


47 

would always be his home, because his heart was 
there. 

He had passed round the wheel-house and came sud¬ 
denly upon an odd figure crumpled in a chair. It was 
Stampede Smith. In the clearer light that came with 
the dissolution of the sea-mist Alan saw that he was 
not asleep. He paused, unseen by the other. Stampede 
stretched himself, groaned, and stood up. He was a 
little man, and his fiercely bristling red whiskers, wet 
with dew, were luxuriant enough for a giant. His 
head of tawny hair, bristling like his whiskers, added 
to the piratical effect of him above the neck, but below 
that part of his anatomy there was little to strike fear 
into the hearts of humanity. Some people smiled when 
they looked at him. Others, not knowing their man, 
laughed outright. Whiskers could be funny. And they 
were undoubtedly funny on Stampede Smith. But 
Alan neither smiled nor laughed, for in his heart was 
something very near to the missing love of brother¬ 
hood for this little man who had written his name 
across so many pages of Alaskan history. 

This morning, as Alan §aw him, Stampede Smith 
was no longer the swiftest gunman between White 
Horse and Dawson City. He was a pathetic reminder 
of the old days when, single-handed, he had run down 
Soapy Smith and his gang—days when the going of 
Stampede Smith to new fields meant a stampede behind 
him, and when his name was mentioned in the same 
breath with those of George Carmack, and Alex 


48 THE ALASKAN 

McDonald, and Jerome Chute, and a hundred men like 
Curley Monroe and Joe Barret set their compasses by 
his. To Alan there was tragedy in his aloneness as 
he stood in the gray of the morning. Twenty times a 
millionaire, he knew that Stampede Smith was broke 
again. 

“Good morning,” he said so unexpectedly that the 
little man jerked himself round like the lash of a whip, 
a trick of the old gun days. “Why so much loneliness, 
Stampede ?” 

Stampede grinned wryly. He had humorous, blue 
eyes, buried like an Airedale’s under brows which 
bristled even more fiercely than his whiskers. “I’m 
thinkin’,” said he, “what a fool thing is money. Good 
mornin’, Alan!” 

He nodded and chuckled, and continued to chuckle 
in the face of the lifting fog, and Alan saw the old 
humor which had always been Stampede’s last asset 
when in trouble. He drew nearer and stood beside 
him, so that their shoulders touched as they leaned 
over the rail. 

“Alan,” said Stampede, “it ain’t often I have a big 
thought, but I’ve been having one all night. Ain’t for¬ 
got Bonanza, have you ?” 

Alan shook his head. “As long as there is an 
Alaska, we won’t forget Bonanza, Stampede.” 

“I took a million out of it, next to Carmack’s Dis¬ 
covery—an’ went busted afterward, didn’t I?” 

Alan nodded without speaking. 


THE ALASKAN 


49 

“But that wasn’t a circumstance to Gold Run Creek, 
over the Divide,” Stampede continued ruminatively. 
“Ain’t forgot old Aleck McDonald, the Scotchman, 
have you, Alan? In the ‘wash’ of Ninety-eight we 
took up seventy sacks to bring our gold back in and we 
lacked thirty of doin’ the job. Nine hundred thousand 
dollars in a single clean-up, and that was only the begin¬ 
ning. Well, I went busted again. And old Aleck 
went busted later on. But he had a pretty wife left 
A girl from Seattle. I had to grub-stake.” 

He was silent for a moment, caressing his damp 
whiskers, as he noted the first rose-flush of the sun 
breaking through the mist between them and the un¬ 
seen mountain tops. 

“Five times after that I made strikes and went 
busted,” he said a little proudly. “And I’m busted 
again!” 

“I know it,” sympathized Alan. 

“They took every cent away from me down in Seattle 
an’ Frisco,” chuckled Stampede, rubbing his hands to¬ 
gether cheerfully, “an’ then bought me a ticket to Nome. 
Mighty fine of them, don’t you think ? Couldn’t have 
been more decent. I knew that fellow Kopf had a 
heart. That’s why I trusted him with my money. It 
wasn’t his fault he lost it.” 

“Of course not,” agreed Alan. 

“And I’m sort of sorry I shot him up for it. I am, 
for a fact.” 

“You killed him?” 


5 o THE ALASKAN 

“Not quite. I clipped one ear off as a reminder, down 
in Chink Holleran’s place. Mighty sorry. Didn’t 
think then how decent it was of him to buy me a ticket 
to Nome. I just let go in the heat of the moment. 
He did me a favor in cleanin’ me, Alan. He did, so 
help me! You don’t realize how free an’ easy an’ 
beautiful everything is until you’re busted.” 

Smiling, his odd face almost boyish behind its am¬ 
bush of hair, he saw the grim look in Alan’s eyes and 
about his jaws. He caught hold of the other’s arm and 
shook it. 

“Alan, I mean it!” he declared. “That’s why I 
think money is a fool thing. It ain’t spendin’ money 
that makes me happy. It’s findin’ it—the gold in the 
mountains—that makes the blood run fast through my 
gizzard. After I’ve found it, I can’t find any use for 
it in particular. I want to go broke. If I didn’t, I’d 
get lazy and fat, an’ some newfangled doctor would 
operate on me, and I’d die. They’re doing a lot of that 
operatin’ down in Frisco, Alan. One day I had a pain, 
and they wanted to cut out something from inside me. 
Think what can happen to a man when he’s got money!” 

“You mean all that, Stampede?” 

“On my life, I do. I’m just aching for the open 
skies, Alan. The mountains. And the yellow stuff 
that’s going to be my playmate till I die. Somebody’!* 
grub-stake me in Nome.” 

“They won’t,” said Alan suddenly. “Not if I cau 
help it. Stampede, I want you. I want you with me 


THE ALASKAN 


5i 

tip under the Endicott Mountains. Eve got ten thou¬ 
sand reindeer up there. It’s No Man’s Land, and we 
can do as we please in it. I’m not after gold. I want 
another sort of thing. But I’ve fancied the Endicott 
ranges are full of that yellow playmate of yours. It’s 
a new country. You’ve never seen it. God only knows 
what you may find. Will you come ?” 

The humorous twinkle had gone out of Stampede’s 
eyes. He was staring at Alan. 

“Will I come? Alan, will a cub nurse its mother? 
Try me. Ask me. Say it all over ag’in.” 

The two men gripped hands. Smiling, Alan nodded 
to the east. The last of the fog was clearing swiftly. 
The tips of the cragged Alaskan ranges rose up against 
the blue of a cloudless sky, and the morning sun was 
flashing in rose and gold at their snowy peaks. Stam¬ 
pede also nodded. Speech was unnecessary. They 
both understood, and the thrill of the life they loved 
passed from one to the other in the grip of their hands. 


CHAPTER V 


B REAKFAST hour was half over when Alan went 
into the dining-room. There were only two empty 
chairs at his table. One was his own. The other be¬ 
longed to Mary Standish. There was something almost 
aggressively suggestive in their simultaneous vacancy, 
it struck him at first. He nodded as he sat down, a flash 
of amusement in his eyes when he observed the look in 
the young engineer’s face. It was both envious and 
accusing, and yet Alan was sure the young man was 
unconscious of betraying an emotion. The fact lent 
to the eating of his grapefruit an accompaniment of 
pleasing and amusing thought. He recalled the young 
man’s name. It was Tucker. He was a clean-faced, 
athletic, likable-looking chap. And an idiot would have 
guessed the truth, Alan told himself. The young en¬ 
gineer was more than casually interested in Mary 
Standish; he was in love. It was not a discovery 
which Alan made. It was a decision, and as soon 
as possible he would remedy the unfortunate omission 
of a general introduction at their table by bringing 
the two together. Such an introduction would un¬ 
doubtedly relieve him of a certain responsibility which 
had persisted in attaching itself to him 
5 ?- 


[THE ALASKAN 53 

So he tried to think. But in spite of his resolution 
he could not get the empty chair opposite him out of his 
mind. It refused to be obliterated, and when other 
chairs became vacant as their owners left the table, this 
one straight across from him continued to thrust itself 
upon him. Until this morning it had been like other 
empty chairs. Now it was persistently annoying, in¬ 
asmuch as he had no desire to be so constantly reminded 
of last night, and the twelve o’clock tryst of Mary 
Standish with Graham’s agent, Rossland. 

He was the last at the table. Tucker, remaining 
until his final hope of seeing Mary Standish was gone, 
rose with two others. The first two had made their 
exit through the door leading from the dining salon 
when the young engineer paused. Alan, watching him, 
saw a sudden change in his face. In a moment it was 
explained. Mary Standish came in. She passed 
Tucker without appearing to notice him, and gave Alan 
a cool little nod as she seated herself at the table. 
She was very pale. He could see nothing of the flush 
of color that had been in her cheeks last night. As 
she bowed her head a little, arranging her dress, a pool 
of sunlight played in her hair, and Alan was staring 
at it when she raised her eyes. They were coolly beau¬ 
tiful, very direct, and without embarrassment. Some¬ 
thing inside him challenged their loveliness. It 
seemed inconceivable that such eyes could play a part 
in fraud and deception, yet he was in possession of 
quite conclusive proof of it. If they had lowered them- 


S4 THE ALASKAN 

selves an instant, if they had in any way betrayed a 
shadow of regret, he would have found an apology. 
Instead of that, his fingers touched the handkerchief in 
his pocket. 

“Did you sleep well, Miss Standish?” he asked 
politely. 

“Not at all,” she replied, so frankly that his convic¬ 
tion was a bit unsettled. “I tried to powder away the 
dark rings under my eyes, but I am afraid I have 
failed. Is that why you ask?” 

He was holding the handkerchief in his hand. “This 
is the first morning I have seen you at breakfast. I 
accepted it for granted you must have slept well. Is 
this yours,.Miss Standish?” 

He watched her face as she took the crumpled bit of 
cambric from his fingers. In a moment she was smil¬ 
ing. The smile was not forced. It was the quick 
response to a feminine instinct of pleasure, and he 
was disappointed not to catch in her face a betrayal of 
embarrassment. 

“It is my handkerchief, Mr. Holt. Where did you 
find it?” 

“In front of my cabin door a little after midnight.” 

He was almost brutal in the definiteness of detail. 
He expected some kind of result. But there was none, 
except that the smile remained on her lips a moment 
longer, and there was a laughing flash back in the clear 
depths of her eyes. Her level glance was as innocent as 
a child’s and as he looked at her, he thought of a child 


THE ALASKAN 


5S 

*-a most beautiful child—and so utterly did he feel 
the discomfiture of his mental analysis of her that he 
rose to his feet with a frigid bow. 

“I thank you, Mr. Holt, ,, she said. “You can 
imagine my sense of obligation when I tell you I have 
only three handkerchiefs aboard the ship with me. And 
this is my favorite.” 

She busied herself with the breakfast card, and as 
Alan left, he heard her give the waiter an order for 
fruit and cereal. His blood was hot, but the flush of 
it did not show in his face. He felt the uncomfortable 
sensation of her eyes following him as he stalked 
through the door. He did not look back. Something 
was wrong with him, and he knew it. This chit of a 
girl with her smooth hair and clear eyes had thrown a 
grain of dust into the satisfactory mechanism of his 
normal self, and the grind of it was upsetting certain 
specific formulae which made up his life. He was a 
fool. He lighted a cigar and called himself names. 

Someone brushed against him, jarring the hand 
that held the burning match. He looked up. It was 
Rossland. The man had a mere twist of a smile on 
his lips. In his eyes was a coolly appraising look as 
he nodded. 

“Beg pardon.” The words were condescending, 
carelessly flung at him over Rossland’s shoulder. He 
might as well have said, “I’m sorry, Boy, but you must 
keep out of my way.” 

Alan smiled back and returned the nod. Once, in 


S 6 THE ALASKAN 

a spirit of sauciness, Keok had told him his eyes were 
like purring cats when he was in a humor to kill. 
They were like that now as they flashed their smile at 
Rossland. The sneering twist left Rossland’s lips as 
he entered the dining-room. 

A rather obvious prearrangement between Mary 
Standish and John Graham’s agent, Alan thought. 
There were not half a dozen people left at the tables, 
and the scheme was that Rossland should be served tete- 
a-tete with Miss Standish, of course. That, apparently, 
was why she had greeted him with such cool civility. 
Her anxiety for him to leave the table before Rossland 
appeared upon the scene was evident, now that he 
understood the situation. 

He puffed at his cigar. Rossland’s interference had 
spoiled a perfect lighting of it, and he struck another 
match. This time he was successful, and he was about 
to extinguish the burning end when he hesitated and 
held it until the fire touched his flesh. Mary Standish 
was coming through the door. Amazed by the sud¬ 
denness of her appearance, he made no movement ex¬ 
cept to drop the match. Her eyes were flaming, and 
two vivid spots burned in her cheeks. She saw him 
and gave the slightest inclination to her head as she 
passed. When she had gone, he could not resist look¬ 
ing into the salon. As he expected, Rossland was 
seated in a chair next to the one she had occupied, and 
was calmly engaged in looking over the breakfast card. 

All this was rather interesting, Alan conceded, if one 


THE ALASKAN . 57 

liked puzzles. Personally he had no desire to become an 
answerer of conundrums, and he was a little ashamed 
of the curiosity that had urged him to look in upon 
Rossland. At the same time he was mildly elated at 
the freezing reception which Miss Standish had evi¬ 
dently given to the dislikable individual who had jostled 
him in passing. 

He went on deck. The sun was pouring in an 
iridescent splendor over the snowy peaks of the moun¬ 
tains, and it seemed as if he could almost reach out his 
arms and touch them. The Nome appeared to be 
drifting in the heart of a paradise of mountains. East¬ 
ward, very near, was the mainland; so close on the 
other hand that he could hear the shout of a man 
was Douglas Island, and ahead, reaching out like a 
silver-blue ribbon was Gastineau Channel. The min¬ 
ing towns of Treadwell and Douglas were in sight. 

Someone nudged him, and he found Stampede 
Smith at his side. 

‘‘That’s Bill Treadwell’s place,” he said. “Once the 
richest gold mines in Alaska. They’re flooded now* 
I knew Bill when he was worrying about the price of 
a pair of boots. Had to buy a second-hand pair an’ 
patched ’em himself. Then he struck it lucky, got four 
hundred dollars somewhere, and bought some claims 
over there from a man named French Pete. They 
called it Glory Hole. An’ there was a time when there 
were nine hundred stamps at work. Take a look, Alan. 
It’s worth it.” 


58 THE ALASKAN 

Somehow Stampede’s voice and information lacked 
appeal. The decks were crowded with passengers as 
the ship picked her way into Juneau, and Alan wan¬ 
dered among them with a gathering sense of disillusion¬ 
ment pressing upon him. He knew that he was look¬ 
ing with more than casual interest for Mary Standish, 
and he was glad when Stampede bumped into an old 
acquaintance and permitted him to be alone. He was 
not pleased with the discovery, and yet he was com¬ 
pelled to acknowledge the truth of it. The grain of 
dust had become more than annoying. It did not wear 
away, as he had supposed it would, but was becoming 
an obsessive factor in his thoughts. And the half¬ 
desire it built up in him, while aggravatingly persistent, 
was less disturbing than before. The little drama in 
the dining-room had had its effect upon him in spite of 
himself. He liked fighters. And Mary Standish, in¬ 
tensely feminine in her quiet prettiness, had shown her 
mettle in those few moments when he had seen her 
flashing eyes and blazing cheeks after leaving Ross- 
land. He began to look for Rossland, too. He was 
in a humor to meet him. 

Not until Juneau hung before him in all its pictur¬ 
esque beauty, literally terraced against the green sweep 
of Mount Juneau, did he go down to the lower deck. 
The few passengers ready to leave the ship gathered 
near the gangway with their luggage. Alan was about 
to pass them when he suddenly stopped. A short dis¬ 
tance from him, where he could see every person who 


THE ALASKAN 


59 

disembarked, stood Rossland. There was something 
grimly unpleasant in his attitude as he fumbled his 
watch-fob and eyed the stair from above. His watch¬ 
fulness sent an unexpected thrill through Alan. Like 
a shot his mind jumped to a conclusion. He stepped 
to Rossland’s side and touched his arm. 

“Watching for Miss Standish?” he asked. 

“I am.” There was no evasion in Rossland’s words. 
They possessed the hard and definite quality of one 
who had an incontestable authority behind him. 

“And if she goes ashore?” 

“I am going too. Is it any affair of yours, Mr. 
Holt? Has she asked you to discuss the matter with 
me? If so—” 

“No, Miss Standish hasn’t done that.” 

“Then please attend to your own business. If you 
haven’t enough to take up your time, I’ll lend you some 
books. I have several in my cabin.” 

Without waiting for an answer Rossland coolly 
moved away. Alan did not follow. There was noth¬ 
ing for him to resent, nothing for him to imprecate 
but his own folly. Rossland’s words were not an in¬ 
sult. They were truth. He had deliberately intruded 
in an affair which was undoubtedly of a highly private 
nature. Possibly it was a domestic tangle. He shud¬ 
dered. A sense of humiliation swept over him, and 
he was glad that Rossland did not even look back at 
him. He tried to whistle as he climbed back to the 
main-deck; Rossland, even though he detested the man, 


CO THE ALASKAN 

had set him right. And he would lend him books, if 
he wanted to be amused! Egad, but the fellow had 
turned the trick nicely. And it was something to be 
remembered. He stiffened his shoulders and found 
old Donald Hardwick and Stampede Smith. He did 
not leave them until the Nome had landed her passen¬ 
gers and freight and was churning her way out of 
Gastineau Channel toward Skagway. Then he went to 
the smoking-room and remained there until luncheon 
hour. 

Today Mary Standish was ahead of him at the table. 
She was seated with her back toward him as he entered, 
so she did nor see him as he came up behind her, so 
near that his coat brushed her chair. He looked across 
at her and smiled as he seated himself. She returned 
the smile, but it seemed to him an apologetic little 
effort. She did not look well, and her presence at the 
table struck him as being a brave front to hide some¬ 
thing from someone. Casually he looked over his left 
shoulder. Rossland was there, in his seat at the oppo¬ 
site side of the room. Indirect as his glance had been, 
Alan saw the girl understood the significance of it. 
She bowed her head a little, and her long lashes shaded 
her eyes for a moment. He wondered why he always 
looked at her hair first. It had a peculiarly pleasing 
effect on him. He had been observant enough to know 
that she had rearranged it since breakfast, and the 
smooth coils twisted in mysterious intricacy at the 
*xown of her head were like softly glowing velvet* 


THE ALASKAN 


61 


The ridiculous thought came to him that he would like 
to see them tumbling down about her. They must 
be even more beautiful when freed from their bondage. 

The pallor of her face was unusual. Possibly it was 
the way the light fell upon her through the window. 
But when she looked across at him again, he caught 
for an instant the tiniest quiver about her mouth. He 
began telling her something about Skagway, quite care¬ 
lessly, as if he had seen nothing which she might want 
to conceal. The light in her eyes changed, and it was 
almost a glow of gratitude he caught in them. He had 
broken a tension, relieved her of some unaccountable 
strain she was under. He noticed that her ordering of 
food was merely a pretense. She scarcely touched it, 
and yet he was sure no other person at the table had 
discovered the insincerity of her effort, not even 
Tucker, the enamored engineer. It was likely Tucker 
placed a delicate halo about her lack of appetite, accept¬ 
ing daintiness of that sort as an angelic virtue. 

Only Alan, sitting opposite her, guessed the truth. 
She was making a splendid effort, but he felt that every 
nerve in her body was at the breaking-point. When 
she arose from her seat, he thrust back his own chair. 
At the same time he saw Rossland get up and advance 
rather hurriedly from the opposite side of the room. 
The girl passed through the door first, Rossland fol¬ 
lowed a dozen steps behind, and Alan came last, almost 
shoulder to shoulder with Tucker. It was amusing in 


62 


THE ALASKAN 

a way, yet beyond the humor of it was. something that 
drew a grim line about the corners of his mouth. 

At the foot of the luxuriously carpeted stair leading 
from the dining salon to the main deck Miss Standish 
suddenly stopped and turned upon Rossland. For only 
an instant her eyes were leveled at him. Then they 
flashed past him, and with a swift movement she came 
toward Alan. A flush had leaped into her cheeks, but 
there was no excitement in her voice when she spoke. 
Yet it was distinct, and clearly heard by Rossland. 

“I understand we are approaching Skagway, Mr. 
Holt,” she said. “Will you take me on deck, and tell 
me about it?” 

Graham’s agent had paused at the foot of the stair 
and was slowly preparing to light a cigarette. Recall¬ 
ing his humiliation of a few hours before at Juneau, 
when the other had very clearly proved him a meddler, 
words refused to form quickly on Alan’s lips. Before 
he was ready with an answer Mary Standish had con¬ 
fidently taken his arm. He could see the red flush 
deepening in her upturned face. She was amazingly 
unexpected, bewilderingly pretty, and as cool as ice 
except for the softly glowing fire in her cheeks. He 
saw Rossland staring with his cigarette half poised. It 
was instinctive for him to smile in the face of dan¬ 
ger, and he smiled now, without speaking. The girl 
laughed softly. She gave his arm a gentle tug, and 
he found himself moving past Rossland, amazed but 


THE ALASKAN 63 

obedient, her eyes looking at him in a way that sent a 
gentle thrill through him. 

At the head of the wide stair she whispered, with her 
lips close to his shoulder: “You are splendid! I thank 
you, Mr. Holt.” 

Her words, along with the decisive relaxing of her 
hand upon his arm, were like a dash of cold water in 
his face. Rossland could no longer see them, unless 
he had followed. The girl had played her part, and a 
second time he had accepted the role of a slow-witted 
fool. But the thought did not anger him. There was 
a remarkable element of humor about it for him, view¬ 
ing himself in the matter, and Mary Standish heard 
him chuckling as they came out on deck. 

Her fingers tightened resentfully upon his arm. “It 
isn’t funny,” she reproved. “It is tragic to be bored 
by a man like that.’/ 

He knew she was politely lying to anticipate the 
question he might ask, and he wondered what would 
happen if he embarrassed her by letting her know 
he had seen her alone with Rossland at midnight. He 
looked down at her, and she met his scrutiny unflinch¬ 
ingly. She even smiled at him, and her eyes, he 
thought, were the loveliest liars he had ever looked 
into. He felt the stir of an unusual sentiment—a sort 
of pride in her, and he made up his mind to say noth¬ 
ing about Rossland. He was still absurdly convinced 
that he had not the smallest interest in affairs which 
were not entirely his own. Mary Standish evidently 


64 THE ALASKAN 

believed he was blind, and he would make no effort 
to spoil her illusion. Such a course would undoubtedly 
be most satisfactory in the end. 

Even now she seemed to have forgotten the incident 
at the foot of the stair. A softer light was in her 
eyes when they came to the bow of the ship, and Alan 
fancied he heard a strange little cry on her lips as she 
looked about her upon the paradise of Taiya Inlet. 
Straight ahead, like a lilac ribbon, ran the narrow 
waterway to Skagway’s door, while on both sides rose 
high mountains, covered with green forests to the 
snowy crests that gleamed like white blankets near the 
clouds. In this melting season there came to them 
above the slow throb of the ship’s engines the liquid 
music of innumerable cascades, and from a mountain 
that seemed to float almost directly over their heads 
fell a stream of water a sheer thousand feet to the sea, 
smoking and twisting in the sunshine like a living thing 
at play. And then a miracle happened which even 
Alan wondered at, for the ship seemed to stand still 
and the mountain to swing slowly, as if some unseen 
and mighty force were opening a guarded door, and 
green foothills with glistening white cottages floated 
into the picture, and Skagway, heart of romance, mon¬ 
ument to brave men and thrilling deeds, drifted out 
slowly from its hiding-place. Alan turned to speak, 
but what he saw in the girl’s face held him silent. Her 
lips were parted, and she was staring as if an un- 


THE ALASKAN 65 

expected thing had risen before her eyes, something 
that bewildered her and even startled her. 

And then, as if speaking to herself and not to Alan 
Holt, she said in a tense whisper: “I have seen this 
place before. It was a long time ago. Maybe it was 
a hundred years or a thousand. But -I have been here. 
I have lived under that mountain with the waterfall 
creeping down it—” 

A tremor ran through her, and she remembered 
Alan. She looked up at him, and he was puzzled. A 
weirdly beautiful mystery lay in her eyes. 

“I must go ashore here,” she said. “I didn’t know 
I would find it so soon. Please—” 

With her hand touching his arm she turned. He 
was looking at her and saw the strange light fade 
swiftly out of her eyes. Following her glance he saw 
Rossland standing half a dozen paces behind them. 

In another moment Mary Standish was facing the 
sea, and again her hand was resting confidently in the 
crook of Alan’s arm. “Did you ever feel like killing 
a man, Mr. Holt?” she asked with an icy little laugh. 

“Yes,” he answered rather unexpectedly. “And 
some day, if the right opportunity comes, I am going 
to kill a certain man—the man who murdered my 
father.” 

She gave a little gasp of horror. “Your father— 
was—murdered—’ ’ 

“Indirectly—yes. It wasn’t done with knife or gun, 
Miss Standish. Money was the weapon. Somebody’s 



66 


THE ALASKAN 

money. And John Graham was the man who struck 
the blow. Some day, if there is justice, I shall kill 
him. And right now, if you will allow me to demand 
an explanation of this man Rossland 

"No.” Her hand tightened on his arm. Then, 
slowly, she drew it away. “I don’t want you to ask 
an explanation of him,” she said. “If he should make 
it, you would hate me. Tell me about Skagway, Mr, 
Holt. That will be pleasanter,” 


CHAPTER VI 


OT until early twilight came with the deep shad- 
^ ows of the western mountains, and the Nome was 
churning slowly back through the narrow water-trails 
to the open Pacific, did the significance of that after¬ 
noon fully impress itself upon Alan. For hours he 
had surrendered himself to an impulse which he could 
not understand, and which in ordinary moments he 
would not have excused. He had taken Mary Standish 
ashore. For two hours she had walked at his side, 
asking him questions and listening to him as no other 
had ever questioned him or listened to him before. He 
had shown her Skagway. Between the mountains he 
pictured the wind-racked canon where Skagway grew 
from one tent to hundreds in a day, from hundreds to 
thousands in a week; he visioned for her the old days 
of romance, adventure, and death; he told her of Soapy 
Smith and his gang of outlaws, and side by side they 
stood over Soapy’s sunken grave as the first somber 
shadows of the mountains grew upon them. 

But among it all, and through it all, she had asked 
him about himself. And he had responded. Until 
now he did not realize how much he had confided in 
her. It seemed to him that the very soul of this slim 
67 


68 THE ALASKAN 

and beautiful girl who had walked at his side had urged 
him on to the indiscretion of personal confidence. He 
had seemed to feel her heart beating with his own as 
he described his beloved land under the Endicott Moun¬ 
tains, with its vast tundras, his herds, and his people. 
There, he had told her, a new world was in the making, 
and the glow in her eyes and the thrilling something 
in her voice had urged him on until he forgot that Ross- 
land was waiting at the ship’s gangway to see when 
they returned. He had built up for her his castles in 
the air, and the miracle of it was that she had helped 
him to build them. He had described for her the 
change that was creeping slowly over Alaska, the re¬ 
placement of mountain trails by stage and automobile 
highways, the building of railroads, the growth of 
cities where tents had stood a few years before. It 
was then, when he had pictured progress and civiliza¬ 
tion and the breaking down of nature’s last barriers 
before science and invention, that he had seen a cloud 
of doubt in her gray eyes. 

And now, as they stood on the deck of the Nome 
looking at the white peaks of the mountains dissolving 
into the lavender mist of twilight, doubt and perplexity 
were still deeper in her eyes, and she said: 

“I would always love tents and old trails and nature’s 
barriers. I envy Belinda Mulrooney, whom you told 
me about this afternoon. I hate cities and railroads 
and automobiles, and all that goes with them, and I 


THE ALASKAN 69 

am sorry to see those things come to Alaska. And I, 
too, hate this man—John Graham!” 

Her words startled him. 

“And I want you to tell me what he is doing—with 
his money—now.” Her voice was cold, and one little 
hand, he noticed, was clenched at the edge of the rail. 

“He has stripped Alaskan waters of fish resources 
which will never be replaced, Miss Standish. But that 
is not all. I believe I state the case well within fact 
when I say he has killed many women and little 
children by robbing the inland waters of the food sup¬ 
plies upon which the natives have subsisted for cen¬ 
turies. I know. I have seen them die.” 

It seemed to him that she swayed against him for an 
instant. 

“And that—is all ?” 

He laughed grimly. “Possibly some people would 
think it enough, Miss Standish. But the tentacles of 
his power are reaching everywhere in Alaska. His 
agents swarm throughout the territory, and Soapy 
Smith was a gentleman outlaw compared with these 
men and their master. If men like John Graham are 
allowed to have their way, in ten years greed and graft 
will despoil what two hundred years of Rooseveltian 
conservation would not be able to replace.” 

She raised her head, and in the dusk her pale face 
looked up at the ghost-peaks of the mountains still 
visible through the thickening gloom of evening. “I 
am glad you told me about Belinda Mulrooney,” she 


THE ALASKAN 


70 

said. “I am beginning to understand, and it gives me 
courage to think of a woman like her. She could fight, 
couldn’t she? She could make a man’s fight?” 

“Yes, and did make it.” 

“And she had no money to give her power. Her 
last dollar, you told me, she flung into the Yukon for 
luck.” 

“Yes, at Dawson. It was the one thing between her 
and hunger.” 

She raised her hand, and on it he saw gleaming 
faintly the single ring which she wore. Slowly she 
drew it from her finger. 

“Then this, too, for luck—the luck of Mary Stand- 
ish,” she laughed softly, and flung the ring into the sea. 

She faced him, as if expecting the necessity of 
defending what she had done. “It isn’t melodrama,” 
she said. “I mean it. And I believe in it. I want 
something of mine to lie at the bottom of the sea in 
this gateway to Skagway, just as Belinda Mulrooney 
wanted her dollar to rest forever at the bottom of the 
Yukon.” 

She gave him the hand from which she had taken 
the ring, and for a moment the warm thrill of it lay 
in his own. “Thank you for the wonderful afternoon 
you have given me, Mr. Holt. I shall never forget it. 
It is dinner time. I must say good night.” 

He followed her slim figure with his eyes until she 
disappeared. In returning to his cabin he almost 
bumped into Rossland. The incident was irritating. 


THE ALASKAN 


7 * 

Neither of the men spoke or nodded, but Rossland met 
Alan’s look squarely, his face rock-like in its repression 
of emotion. Alan’s impression of the man was chang¬ 
ing in spite of his prejudice. There was a growing 
something about him which commanded attention, a 
certainty of poise which could not be mistaken for 
sham. A scoundrel he might be, but a cool brain was 
at work inside his head—a brain not easily disturbed 
by unimportant things, he decided. He disliked the 
man. As an agent of John Graham Alan looked upon 
him as an enemy, and as an acquaintance of Mary 
Standish he was as much of a mystery as the girl her¬ 
self. And only now, in his cabin, was Alan beginning 
to sense the presence of a real authority behind Ross- 
land’s attitude. 

He was not curious. All his life he had lived too 
near the raw edge of practical things to dissipate in 
gossipy conjecture. He cared nothing about the re¬ 
lationship between Mary Standish and Rossland except 
as it involved himself, and the situation had become a 
trifle too delicate to please him. He could see no sport 
in an adventure of the kind it suggested, and the pos¬ 
sibility that he had been misjudged by both Rossland 
and Mary Standish sent a flush of anger into his 
cheeks. He cared nothing for Rossland, except that 
he would like to wipe him out of existence with all 
other Graham agents. And he persisted in the con¬ 
viction that he thought of the girl only in a most casual 
sort of way. He had made no effort to discover her 


72 THE ALASKAN 

history. He had not questioned her. At no time had 
he intimated a desire to intrude upon her personal 
affairs, and at no time had she offered information 
about herself, or an explanation of the singular espio 
nage which Rossland had presumed to take upon him¬ 
self. He grimaced as he reflected how dangerously near 
that hazard he had been—and he admired her for the 
splendid judgment she had shown in the matter. She 
had saved him the possible alternative of apologizing to 
Rossland or throwing him overboard! 

There was a certain bellicose twist to his mind as 
he went down to the dining salon, an obstinate deter¬ 
mination to hold himself aloof from any increasing in¬ 
timacy with Mary Standish. No matter how pleasing 
his experience had been, he resented the idea of being 
commandeered at unexpected moments. Had Mary 
Standish read his thoughts, her bearing toward him 
during the dinner hour could not have been more sat¬ 
isfying. There was, in a way, something seductively 
provocative about it. She greeted him with the slight¬ 
est inclination of her head and a cool little smile. 
Her attitude did not invite spoken words, either from 
him or from his neighbors, yet no one would have 
accused her of deliberate reserve. 

Her demure unapproachableness was a growing 
revelation to him, and he found himself interested in 
spite of the new law of self-preservation he had set 
down for himself. He could not keep his eyes from 
stealing glimpses at her hair when her head was bowed 


THE ALASKAN 


73 

a little. She had smoothed it tonight until it was 
like softest velvet, with rich glints in it, and the amazing 
thought came to him that it would be sweetly pleasant 
to touch with one’s hand. The discovery was almost 
a shock. Keok and Nawadlook had beautiful hair, 
but he had never thought of it in this way. And he 
had never thought of Keok’s pretty mouth as he was 
thinking of the girl’s opposite him. He shifted un¬ 
easily and was glad Mary Standish did not look at him 
in these moments of mental unbalance. 

When he left the table, the girl scarcely noticed his 
going. It was as if she had used him and then calmly 
shuttled him out of the way. He tried to laugh as he 
hunted up Stampede Smith. He found him, half an 
hour later, feeding a captive bear on the lower deck. 
It was odd, he thought, that a captive bear should be 
going north. Stampede explained. The animal was 
a pet and belonged to the Thlinkit Indians. There 
were seven, getting off at Cordova. Alan observed 
that the two girls watched him closely and whispered 
together. They were very pretty, with large, dark 
eyes and pink in their cheeks. One of the men did 
not look at him at all, but sat cross-legged on the deck, 
with his face turned away. 

With Stampede he went to the smoking-room, and 
until a late hour they discussed the big range up under 
the Endicott Mountains, and Alan’s plans for the fu¬ 
ture. Once, early in the evening, Alan went to his cabin 
to get maps and photographs. Stampede’s eyes glis- 


THE ALASKAN 


74 

tened as his mind seized upon the possibilities of the 
new adventure. It was a vast land. An unknown 
country. And Alan was its first pioneer. The old thrill 
ran in Stampede’s blood, and its infectiousness caught 
Alan, so that he forgot Mary Standish, and all else but 
the miles that lay between them and the mighty tundras 
beyond the Seward Peninsula. It was midnight when 
Alan went to his cabin. 

He was happy. Love of life swept in an irresistible 
surge through his body, and he breathed in deeply of 
the soft sea air that came in through his open port 
from the west. In Stampede Smith he had at last 
found the comradeship which he had missed, and the 
responsive note to the wild and half-savage desires 
always smoldering in his heart. He looked out at the 
stars and smiled up at them, and his soul was filled with 
an unspoken thankfulness that he was not born too 
late. Another generation and there would be no last 
frontier. Twenty-five years more and the world would 
lie utterly in the shackles of science and invention and 
what the human race called progress. 

So God had been good to him. He was helping to 
write the last page in that history which would go down 
through the eons of time, written in the red blood of 
men who had cut the first trails into the unknown. 
After him, there would be no more frontiers. No 
more mysteries of unknown lands to solve. No more 
pioneering hazards to make. The earth would be 
tamed. And suddenly he thought of Mary Standish 


THE ALASKAN 


75 

and of what she had said to him in the dusk of eve¬ 
ning. Strange that it had been her thought, too—that 
she would always love tents and old trails and nature’s 
barriers, and hated to see cities and railroads and auto¬ 
mobiles come to Alaska. He shrugged his shoulders. 
Probably she had guessed what was in his own mind, 
for she was clever, very clever. 

A tap at his door drew his eyes from the open 
watch in his hand. It was a quarter after twelve 
o’clock, an unusual hour for someone to be tapping 
at his door. 

It was repeated—a bit hesitatingly, he thought. Then 
it came again, quick and decisive. Replacing his watch 
in his pocket, he opened the door. 

It was Mary Standish who stood facing him. 

He saw only her eyes at first, wide-open, strange, 
frightened eyes. And then he saw the pallor of her 
face as she came slowly in, without waiting for him 
to speak or give her permission to enter. And it was 
Mary Standish herself who closed the door, while he 
stared at her in stupid wonderment—and stood there 
with her back against it, straight and slim and deathly; 
pale. 

“May I come in?” she asked. 

“My God, you’re in!” gasped Alan. “You’re in." 


CHAPTER VII 


T HAT it was past midnight, and Mary Standish 
had deliberately come to his room, entering it 
and closing the door without a word or a nod of invita¬ 
tion from him, seemed incredible to Alan. After his 
first explosion of astonishment he stood mute, while 
the girl looked at him steadily and her breath came a 
little quickly. But she was not excited. Even in his 
amazement he could see that. What he had thought 
was fright had gone out of her eyes. But he had 
never seen her so white, and never had she appeared 
quite so slim and childish-looking as while she stood 
there in these astounding moments with her back 
against the door. 

The pallor of her face accentuated the rich darkness 
of her hair. Even her lips were pale. But she was 
not embarrassed. Her eyes were clear and unafraid 
now, and in the poise of her head and body was a sure¬ 
ness of purpose that staggered him. A feeling of 
anger, almost of personal resentment, began to possess 
him as he waited for her to speak. This, at last, was 
the cost of his courtesies to her. The advantage she 
was taking of him was an indignity and an outrage, 
76 


THE ALASKAN 77 

and his mind flashed to the suspicion that Rossland was 
standing just outside the door. 

In another moment he would have brushed her aside 
and opened it, but her quiet face held him. The tense¬ 
ness was fading out of it. He saw her lips tremble, 
and then a miracle happened. In her wide-open, beau¬ 
tiful eyes tears were gathering. Even then she did 
not lower her glance or bury her face in her hands, 
but looked at him bravely while the tear-drops glistened 
like diamonds on her cheeks. He felt his heart give 
way. She read his thoughts, had guessed his suspicion, 
and he was wrong. 

“You—you will have a seat, Miss Standish?” he 
asked lamely, inclining his head toward the cabin chair. 

“No. Please let me stand.” She drew in a deep 
breath. “It is late, Mr. Holt?” 

“Rather an irregular hour for a visit such as this,” 
he assured her. “Half an hour after midnight, to be 
exact. It must be very important business that has 
urged you to make such a hazard aboard ship, Miss 
Standish.” 

For a moment she did not answer him, and he 
saw the little heart-throb in her white throat. 

“Would Belinda Mulrooney have considered this a 
very great hazard, Mr. Holt? In a matter of life and 
death, do you not think she would have come to your 
cabin at midnight—even aboard ship? And it is that 
with me—a matter of life and death. Less than an 


THE ALASKAN 


78 

hour ago I came to that decision. I could not wait 
until morning. I had to see you tonight.” 

“And why me?” he asked. “Why not Rossland, or 
Captain Rifle, or some other? Is it because—” 

He did not finish. He saw the shadow of something 
gather in her eyes, as if for an instant she had felt a 
stab of humiliation or of pain, but it was gone as 
quickly as it came. And very quietly, almost without 
emotion, she answered him. 

“I know how you feel. I have tried to place myself 
in your position. It is all very irregular, as you say. 
But I am not ashamed. I have come to you as I would 
want anyone to come to me under similar circum¬ 
stances, if I were a man. If watching you, thinking 
about you, making up my mind about you is taking an 
advantage—then I have been unfair, Mr. Holt. But 
I am not sorry. I trust you. I know you will be¬ 
lieve me good until I am proved bad. I have come to 
ask you to help me. Would you make it possible for 
another human being to avert a great tragedy if you 
found it in your power to do so?” 

He felt his sense of judgment wavering. Had he 
been coolly analyzing such a situation in the detached 
environment of the smoking-room, he would have called 
any man a fool who hesitated to open his cabin door 
and shovfr his visitor out. But such a thought did not 
occur to him now. He was thinking of the handker¬ 
chief he had found the preceding midnight. Twice she 
had come to his cabin at a late hour. 


THE ALASKAN 


79 

*It would be my inclination to make such a thing 
possible/’ he said, answering her question. “Tragedy 
is a nasty thing.” 

She caught the hint of irony in his voice. If any¬ 
thing, it added to her calmness. He was to suffer no 
weeping entreaties, no feminine play of helplessness and 
beauty. Her pretty mouth was a little firmer and the 
tilt of her dainty chin a bit higher. 

“Of course, I can’t pay you,” she said. “You are 
the sort of man who would resent an offer of payment 
for what I am about to ask you to do. But I must 
have help. If I don’t have it, and quickly”-—she 
shuddered slightly and tried to smile—“something 
very unpleasant will happen, Mr. Holt,” she finished. 

“If you will permit me to take you to Captain 
Rifle—” 

“No. Captain Rifle would question me. He 
would demand explanations. You will understand 
when I tell you what I want. And I will do that if 
I may have your word of honor to hold in confidence 
what I tell you, whether you help me or not. Will 
you give me that pledge?” 

“Yes, if such a pledge will relieve your mind, Miss 
Standish.” 

He was almost brutally incurious. As he reached 
for a cigar, he did not see the sudden movement she 
made, as if about to fly from his room, or the quicker 
throb that came in her throat. When he turned, a faint 
flush was gathering in her cheeks. 


So 


THE ALASKAN 

“I want to leave the ship,” she said. 

The simplicity of her desire held him silent. 

“And I must leave it tonight, or tomorrow night- 
before we reach Cordova.” 

“Is that—your problem ?” he demanded, astonished. 

“No. I must leave it in such a way that the world 
will believe I am dead. I can not reach Cordova alive.” 

At last she struck home and he stared at her, won¬ 
dering if she were insane. Her quiet, beautiful eyes 
met his own with unflinching steadiness. His brain 
all at once was crowded with questioning, but no word 
of it came to his lips. 

“You can help me,” he heard her saying in the same 
quiet, calm voice, softened so that one could not have 
heard it beyond the cabin door. “I haven’t a plan. But 
I know you can arrange one—if you will. It must 
appear to be an accident. I must disappear, fall over¬ 
board, anything, just so the world will believe I am 
dead. It is necessary. And I can not tell you why. 
I can not. Oh, I can not ” 

A note of passion crept into her voice, but it was 
gone in an instant, leaving it cold and steady again. A 
second time she tried to smile. He could see courage, 
and a bit of defiance, shining in her eyes. 

“I know what you are thinking, Mr. Holt. You 
are asking yourself if I am mad, if I am a criminal, 
what my reason can be, and why I haven’t gone to 
Rossland, or Captain Rifle, or some one else. And the 
only answer I can make is that I have come to you 


THE ALASKAN 


81 


because you are the only man in the world—in this 
hour—that I have faith in. Some day you will under¬ 
stand, if you help me. If you do not care to help me—” 

She stopped, and he made a gesture. 

“Yes, if I don’t? What will happen then?” 

“I shall be forced to the inevitable,” she said. “It 
is rather unusual, isn’t it, to be asking for one’s life? 
But that is what I mean.” 

“I’m afraid—I don’t quite understand.” 

“Isn’t it clear, Mr. Holt? I don’t like to appear 
spectacular, and I don’t want you to think of me as 
theatrical—even now. I hate that sort of thing. You 
must simply believe me when I tell you it is impossible 
for me to reach Cordova alive. If you do not help me 
to disappear, help me to live—and at the same time give 
all others the impression that I am dead—then I must 
do the other thing. I must really die.” 

For a moment his eyes blazed angrily. He felt like 
taking her by the shoulders and shaking her, as he 
would have shaken the truth out of a child. 

“You come to me with a silly threat like that, Miss 
Standish? A threat of suicide?” 

“If you want to call it that—yes.” 

“And you expect me to believe you?” 

“I had hoped you would.” 

She had his nerves going. There was no doubt of 
that. He half believed her and half disbelieved. If 
she had cried, if she had made the smallest effort to 
work upon his sentiment, he would have disbelieved 


82 


THE ALASKAN 

utterly. But he was not blind to the fact that she was 
making a brave fight, even though a lie was behind 
it, and with a consciousness of pride that bewildered 
him. 

She was not humiliating herself. Even when she 
saw the struggle going on within him she made no 
effort to turn the balance in her favor. She had stated 
the facts, as she claimed them to be. Now she waited. 
Her long lashes glistened a little. But her eyes were 
clear, and her hair glowed softly, so softly that he 
would never forget it, as she stood there with her 
back against the door, nor the strange desire that came 
to him—even then—to touch it with his hand. 

He nipped off the end of his cigar and lighted a 
match. “It is Rossland,” he said. “You’re afraid of 
Rossland ?” 

“In a way, yes; in a large way, no. I would laugh 
at Rossland if it were not for the other.” 

The other / Why the deuce was she so provokingly 
ambiguous? And she had no intention of explaining. 
She simply waited for him to decide. 

“What other?” he demanded. 

“I can not tell you. I don’t want you to hate me. 
And you would hate me if I told you the truth.” 

“Then you confess you are lying,” he suggested 
brutally. 

Even this did not stir her as he had expected it 
might. It did not anger her or shame her. But she 
raised a pale hand and a little handkerchief to her eyes. 


THE ALASKAN 


83 

and he turned toward the open port, puffing at his cigar, 
knowing she was fighting to keep the tears back. And 
she succeeded. 

“No, I am not lying. What I have told you is true. 
It is because I will not lie that I have not told you more. 
And I thank you for the time you have given me, Mr. 
Holt. That you have not driven me from your cabin 
is a kindness which I appreciate. I have made a mis¬ 
take, that is all. I thought—” 

“How could I bring about what you ask?’’ he in¬ 
terrupted. 

“I don’t know. You are a man. I believed you 
could plan a way, but I see now how foolish I have 
been. It is impossible.” Her hand reached slowly 
for the knob of the door. 

“Yes, you are foolish,” he agreed, and his voice was 
softer. “Don’t let such thoughts overcome you, Miss 
Standish. Go back to your cabin and get a night’s 
sleep. Don’t let Rossland worry you. If you want 
me to settle with that man—” 

“Good night, Mr. Holt.” 

She was opening the door. And as she went out 
she turned a little and looked at him, and now she was 
smiling, and there were tears in her eyes. 

“Good night.” 

“Good night.” 

The door closed behind her. He heard her retreat¬ 
ing footsteps. In half a minute he would have called 
her back. But it was too late. 


CHAPTER VIII 


F OR half an hour Alan sat smoking his cigar. 

Mentally he was not at ease. Mary Standish 
had come to him like a soldier, and she had left him 
like a soldier. But in that last glimpse of her face he 
had caught for an instant something which she had not 
betrayed in his cabin—a stab of what he thought was 
pain in her tear-wet eyes as she smiled, a proud regret, 
possibly a shadow of humiliation at last—or it may 
have been a pity for him. He was not sure. But it 
was not despair. Not once had she whimpered in 
look or word, even when the tears were in her eyes, and 
the thought was beginning to impress itself upon him 
that it was he—and not Mary Standish—who had 
shown a yellow streak this night. A half shame fell 
upon him as he smoked. For it was clear he had not 
come up to her judgment of him, or else he was not so 
big a fool as she had hoped he might be. In his own 
mind, for a time, he was at a loss to decide. 

It was possibly the first time he had ever deeply 
absorbed himself in the analysis of a woman. It was 
outside his business. But, born and bred of the open 
country, it was as natural for him to recognize courage 
as it was for him to breathe. And the girl’s courage 
was unusual, now that he had time to think about it. 
84 


THE ALASKAN 


85 

It was this thought of her coolness and her calm re¬ 
fusal to impose her case upon him with greater warmth 
that comforted him after a little. A young and beauti¬ 
ful woman who was actually facing death would have 
urged her necessity with more enthusiasm, it seemed 
to him. Her threat, when he debated it intelligently, 
was merely thrown in, possibly on the spur of the 
moment, to give impetus to his decision. She had not 
meant it. The idea of a girl like Mary Standish com¬ 
mitting suicide was stupendously impossible. Her 
quiet and wonderful eyes, her beauty and the exquisite 
care which she gave to herself emphasized the absurdity 
of such a supposition. She had come to him bravely. 
There was no doubt of that. She had merely exagger¬ 
ated the importance of her visit. 

Even after he had turned many things over in his 
mind to bolster up this conclusion, he was still not at 
ease. Against his will he recalled certain unpleasant 
things which had happened within his knowledge under 
sudden and unexpected stress of emotion. He tried to 
laugh the absurd stuff out of his thoughts and to the 
end that he might add a new color to his visionings 
he exchanged his half-burned cigar for a black-bowled 
pipe, which he filled and lighted. Then he began walk¬ 
ing back and forth in his cabin, like a big animal in a 
small cage, until at last he stood with his head half 
out of the open port, looking at the clear stars and 
setting the perfume of his tobacco adrift with the soft 
sea wind. 


86 THE ALASKAN 

He felt himself growing comforted. Reason seated 
itself within him again, with sentiment shuttled under 
his feet. If he had been a little harsh with Miss 
Standish tonight, he would make up for it by apolo¬ 
gizing tomorrow. She would probably have recovered 
her balance by that time, and they would laugh over 
her excitement and their little adventure. That is, he 
would. “I’m not at all curious in the matter,” some 
persistent voice kept telling him, “and I haven’t any 
interest in knowing what irrational whim drove her 
to my cabin.” But he smoked viciously and smiled 
grimly as the voice kept at him. He would have liked 
to obliterate Rossland from his mind. But Rossland 
persisted in bobbing up, and with him Mary Standish’s 
words, “If I should make an explanation, you would 
hate me,” or something to that effect. He couldn’t 
remember exactly. And he didn’t want to remember 
exactly, for it was none of his business. 

In this humor, with half of his thoughts on one side 
of the fence and half on the other, he put out his light 
and went to bed. And he began thinking of the Range. 
That was pleasanter. For the tenth time he figured 
out how long it would be before the glacial-twisted 
ramparts of the Endicott Mountains rose up in first 
welcome to his home-coming. Carl Lomen, following 
on the next ship, would join him at Unalaska. They 
would go on to Nome together. After that he would 
spend a week or so in the Peninsula, then go up the 
Kobuk, across the big portage to the Koyukuk and the 


THE ALASKAN 


87 

far headwaters of the north, and still farther—beyond 
the last trails of civilized men—to his herds and his 
people. And Stampede Smith would be with him. 
After a long winter of homesickness it was all a com¬ 
forting inducement to sleep and pleasant dreams. But 
somewhere there was a wrong note in his anticipations 
tonight. Stampede Smith slipped away from him, and 
Rossland took his place. And Keok, laughing, 
changed into Mary Standish with tantalizing deviltry. 
It was like Keok, Alan thought drowsily—she was al¬ 
ways tormenting someone. 

He felt better in the morning. The sun was up, 
flooding the wall of his cabin, when he awoke, and 
under him he could feel the roll of the open sea. East¬ 
ward the Alaskan coast was a deep blue haze, but the 
white peaks of the St. Elias Range flung themselves 
high up against the sun-filled sky behind it, like snowy 
banners. The Nome was pounding ahead at full 
speed, and Alan’s blood responded suddenly to the 
impelling thrill of her engines, beating like twin hearts 
with the mighty force that was speeding them on. 
This was business. It meant miles foaming away 
behind them and a swift biting off of space between 
him and Unalaska, midway of the Aleutians. He was 
sorry they were losing time by making the swing up 
the coast to Cordova. And with Cordova he thought 
of Mary Standish. 

He dressed and shaved and went down to breakfast, 
still thinking of her. The thought of meeting her 


88 


THE ALASKAN 


again was rather discomforting, now that the time of 
that possibility was actually at hand, for he dreaded 
moments of embarrassment even when he was not di¬ 
rectly accountable for them. But Mary Standish 
saved him any qualms of conscience which he might 
have had because of his lack of chivalry the preced¬ 
ing night. She was at the table. And she was not at all 
disturbed when he seated himself opposite her. There 
was color in her cheeks, a fragile touch of that warm 
glow in the heart of the wild rose of the tundras. And 
it seemed to him there was a deeper, more beautiful 
light in her eyes than he had ever seen before. 

She nodded, smiled at him, and resumed a conversa¬ 
tion which she had evidently broken for a moment 
with a lady who sat next to her. It was the first time 
Alan had seen her interested in this way. He had no 
intention of listening, but something perverse and com¬ 
pelling overcame his will. He discovered the lady was 
going up to teach in a native school at Noorvik, on the 
Kobuk River, and that for many years she had taught 
in Dawson and knew well the story of Belinda Mul- 
rooney. He gathered that Mary Standish had shown 
a great interest, for Miss Robson, the teacher, was 
offering to send her a photograph she possessed of 
Belinda Mulrooney; if Miss Standish would give her an 
address. The girl hesitated, then said she was not 
certain of her destination, but would write Miss Rob¬ 
son at Noorvik. 


THE ALASKAN 89 

“You will surely keep your promise ?” urged Miss 
Robson. 

“Yes, I will keep my promise.” 

A sense of relief swept over Alan. The words were 
spoken so softly that he thought she had not wanted 
him to hear. It was evident that a few hours’ sleep 
and the beauty of the morning had completely changed 
her mental attitude, and he no longer felt the suspicion 
of responsibility which had persisted in attaching it¬ 
self to him. Only a fool, he assured himself, could 
possibly see a note of tragedy in her appearance now. 
Nor was she different at luncheon or at dinner. Dur¬ 
ing the day he saw nothing of her, and he was growing 
conscious of the fact that she was purposely avoiding 
contact with him. This did not displease him. It 
allowed him to pick up the threads of other interests 
in a normal sort of way. He discussed Alaskan 
politics in the smoking-room, smoked his black pipe 
without fear of giving offense, and listened to the 
talk of the ship with a freedom of mind which he 
had not experienced since his first meeting with Miss 
Standish. Yet, as night drew on, and he walked his 
two-mile promenade about the deck, he felt gathering 
about him a peculiar impression of aloneness. Some¬ 
thing was missing. He did not acknowledge to him¬ 
self what it was until, as if to convict him, he saw 
Mary Standish come out of the door leading from her 
cabin passageway, and stand alone at the rail of the 


90 THE ALASKAN 

ship. For a moment he hesitated, then quietly he came 

up beside her. 

“It has been a wonderful day, Miss Standish,” he 
said, “and Cordova is only a few hours ahead of us ” 

She scarcely turned her face and continued to look 
off into the shrouding darkness of the sea. “Yes, a 
wonderful day, Mr. Holt,” she repeated after him, and 
Cordova is only a few hours ahead.” Then, in the 
same soft, unemotional voice, she added: “I want to 
thank you for last night. You brought me to a great 
decision.” 

“I fear I did not help you.” 

It may have been fancy of the gathering dusk, that 
made him believe he caught a shuddering movement 
of her slim shoulders. 

“I thought there were two ways,” she said, “but you 
made me see there was only one!’ She emphasized 
that word. It seemed to come with a little tremble in 
her voice. “I was foolish. But please let us forget. I 
want to think of pleasanter things. I am about to 
make a great experiment, and it takes all my courage.” 

“You will win, Miss Standish,” he said in a sure 
voice. “In whatever you undertake you will win. I 
know it. If this experiment you speak of is the ad¬ 
venture of coming to Alaska—seeking your fortune— 
finding your life here—it will be glorious. I can as¬ 
sure you of that.” 

She was quiet for a moment, and then said: 

“The unknown has always held a fascination for me 


THE ALASKAN 


91 


When we were under the mountains in Skagway 
yesterday, I almost told you of an odd faith which I 
have. I believe I have lived before, a long time ago, 
when America was very young. At times the feeling 
is so strong that I must have faith in it. Possibly I am 
foolish. But when the mountain swung back, like a 
great door, and we saw Skagway, I knew that some¬ 
time—somewhere—I had seen a thing like that before. 
And I have had strange visions of it. Maybe it is a 
touch of madness in me. But it is that faith which 
gives me courage to go on with my experiment. That 
—and you!^ 

Suddenly she faced him, her eyes flaming. 

“You—and your suspicions and your brutality,” 
she went on, her voice trembling a little as she drew 
herself up straight and tense before him. “I wasn’t go¬ 
ing to tell you, Mr. Holt. But you have given me the 
opportunity, and it may do you good—after tomorrow. 
I came to you because I foolishly misjudged you. I 
thought you were different, like your mountains. I 
made a great gamble, and set you up on a pedestal as 
clean and unafraid and believing all things good until 
you found them bad—and I lost. I was terribly mis¬ 
taken. Your first thoughts of me when I came to your 
cabin were suspicious. You were angry and afraid. 
Yes, afraid —fearful of something happening which 
you didn’t want to happen. You thought, almost, that 
I was unclean. And you believed I was a liar, and 
told me so. It wasn’t fair, Mr. Holt. It wasn’t fair. 


Q 2 THE ALASKAN 

There were things which I couldn’t explain to you, but 
I told you Rossland knew. I didn’t keep everything 
back. And I believed you were big enough to think 
that I was not dishonoring you with my—friendship, 
even though I came to your cabin. Oh, I had that 
much faith in myself—I didn’t think I would be mis* 
taken for something unclean and lying!” 

“Good God!” he cried. “Listen to me—Miss Stand- 
ish—” 

She was gone, so suddenly that his movement to 
intercept her was futile, and she passed through the 
door before he could reach her. Again he called her 
name, but her footsteps were almost running up the 
passageway. He dropped back, his blood cold, his 
hands clenched in the darkness, and his face as white 
as the girl’s had been. Her words had held him 
stunned and mute. He saw himself stripped naked, 
as she believed him to be, and the thing gripped him 
with a sort of horror. And she was wrong. He had 
followed what he believed to be good judgment and 
common sense. If, in doing that, he had been an ac¬ 
cursed fool— 

Determinedly he started for her cabin, his mind 
set upon correcting her malformed judgment of him. 
There was no light coming under her door. When he 
knocked, there was no answer from within. He waited, 
and tried again, listening for a sound of movement. 
And each moment he waited he was readjusting him¬ 
self. He was half glad, in the end, that the door did 


THE ALASKAN 


93 

not open. He believed Miss Standish was inside, and 
she would undoubtedly accept the reason for his com¬ 
ing without an apology in words. 

He went to his cabin, and his mind became increas¬ 
ingly persistent in its disapproval of the wrong view¬ 
point she had taken of him. He was not comfortable, 
no matter how he looked at the thing. For her clear 
eyes, her smoothly glorious hair, and the pride and 
courage with which she had faced him remained with 
him overpoweringly. He could not get away from the 
vision of her as she had stood against the door with 
tears like diamonds on her cheeks. Somewhere he 
had missed fire. He knew it. Something had es¬ 
caped him which he could not understand. And she 
was holding him accountable. 

The talk of the smoking-room did not interest him 
tonight. His efforts to become a part of it were forced. 
A jazzy concert of piano and string music in the social 
hall annoyed him, and a little later he watched the 
dancing with such grimness that someone remarked 
about it. He saw Rossland whirling round the floor 
with a handsome, young blonde in his arms. The girl 
was looking up into his eyes, smiling, and her cheek 
lay unashamed against his shoulder, while Rossland’s 
face rested against her fluffy hair when they mingled 
closely with the other dancers. Alan turned away, 
an unpleasant thought of Rossland’s association with 
Mary Standish in his mind. He strolled down into the 
steerage. The Thlinkit people had shut themselves 


94 THE ALASKAN 

in with a curtain of blankets, and from the stillness he 
judged they were asleep. The evening passed slowly 
for him after that, until at last he went to his cabin and 
tried to interest himself in a book. It was something 
he had anticipated reading, but after a little he 
wondered if the writing was stupid, or if it was him¬ 
self. The thrill he had always experienced with this 
particular writer was missing. There was no inspira¬ 
tion. The words were dead. Even the tobacco in 
his pipe seemed to lack something, and he changed it 
for a cigar—and chose another book. The result 
was the same. His mind refused to function, and 
there was no comfort in his cigar. 

He knew he was fighting against a new thing, even 
as he subconsciously lied to himself. And he was ob¬ 
stinately determined to win. It was a fight between 
himself and Mary Standish as she had stood against 
his door. Mary Standish—the slim beauty of her— 
her courage—a score of things that had never touched 
his life before. He undressed and put on his smok¬ 
ing-gown and slippers, repudiating the honesty of the 
emotions that were struggling for acknowledgment 
within him. He was a bit mad and entirely a fool, 
he told himself. But the assurance did him no good. 

He went to bed, propped himself up against his 
pillows, and made another effort to read. He half¬ 
heartedly succeeded. At ten o’clock music and danc¬ 
ing ceased, and stillness fell over the ship. After that 


THE ALASKAN 


95 

he found himself becoming more interested in the first 
book he had started to read. His old satisfaction 
slowly returned to him. He relighted his cigar and 
enjoyed it. Distantly he heard the ship’s bells, eleven 
o’clock, and after that the half-hour and midnight. 
The printed pages were growing dim, and drowsily 
he marked his book, placed it on the table, and yawned. 
They must be nearing Cordova. He could feel the 
slackened speed of the Nome and the softer throb of 
her engines. Probably they had passed Cape St. Elias 
and were drawing inshore. 

And then, sudden and thrilling, came a woman s 
scream. A piercing cry of terror, of agony—and of 
something else that froze the blood in his veins as he 
sprang from his berth. Twice it came, the second time 
ending in a moaning wail and a man’s husky shout. 
Feet ran swiftly past his window. He heard another 
shout and then a voice of command. He could not 
distinguish the words, but the ship herself seemed to 
respond. There came the sudden smoothness of dead 
engines, followed by the pounding shock of reverse 
and the clanging alarm of a bell calling boats’ crews to 
quarters. 

Alan faced his cabin door. He knew what had 
happened. Someone was overboard. And in this 
moment all life and strength were gone out of his 
body, for the pale face of Mary Standish seemed to 
rise for an instant before him, and in her quiet voice 


THE ALASKAN 


96 

she was telling him again that this was the other way . 
His face went white as he caught up his smoking- 
gown, flung open his door, and ran down the dimly 
lighted corridor. 


CHAPTER IX 


T HE reversing of the engines had not stopped the 
momentum of the ship when Alan reached the 
open deck. She was fighting, but still swept slowly 
ahead against the force struggling to hold her back. 
He heard running feet, voices, and the rattle of davit 
blocks, and came up as the starboard boat aft began 
swinging over the smooth sea. Captain Rifle was 
ahead of him, half-dressed, and the second officer was 
giving swift commands. A dozen passengers had come 
from the smoking-room. There was only one woman. 
She stood a little back, partly supported in a man’s 
arms, her face buried in her hands. Alan looked 
at the man, and he knew from his appearance that 
she was the woman who had screamed. 

He heard the splash of the boat as it struck water, 
and the rattle of oars, but the sound seemed a long 
distance away. Only one thing came to him distinctly 
in the sudden sickness that gripped him, and that was 
the terrible sobbing of the woman. He went to them, 
and the deck seemed to sway under his feet. He was 
conscious of a crowd gathering about the empty davits, 
but he had eyes only for these two. 

“Was it a man—or a woman?” he asked. 

97 


THE ALASKAN 


98 

It did not seem to him it was his voice speaking. 
The words were forced from his lips. And the other 
man, with the woman’s head crumpled against his 
shoulder, looked into a face as emotionless as stone. 

(( A woman,” he replied. “This is my wife. We 
were sitting here when she climbed upon the rail and 
leaped in. My wife screamed when she saw her going.” 

The woman raised her head. She was still sobbing, 
with no tears in her eyes, but only horror. Her hands 
were clenched about her husband’s arm. She struggled 
to speak and failed, and the man bowed his head to 
comfort her. And then Captain Rifle stood at their 
side. His face was haggard, and a glance told Alan 
that he knew. 

“Who was it?” he demanded. 

“This lady thinks it was Miss Standish.” 

Alan did not move or speak. Something seemed 
to have gone wrong for a moment in his head. He 
could not hear distinctly the excitement behind him, 
and before him things were a blur. The sensation 
came and passed swiftly, with no sign of it in the im¬ 
mobility of his pale face. 

“Yes, the girl at your table. The pretty girl. I 
saw her clearly, and then—then—” 

It was the woman. The captain broke in, as she 
caught herself with a choking breath: 

“It is possible you are mistaken. I can not believe 
Miss Standish would do that. We shall soon know. 
Two boats are gone, and a third lowering.” He was 


THE ALASKAN 99 

hurrying away, throwing the last words over his 
shoulder. 

Alan made no movement to follow. His brain 
cleared itself of shock, and a strange calmness began 
to possess him. “You are quite sure it was the girl 
at my table ?” he found himself saying. “Is it possible 
you might be mistaken?” 

“No,” said the woman. “She was so quiet and 
pretty that I have noticed her often. I saw her clearly 
in the starlight. And she saw me just before she 
climbed to the rail and jumped. I’m almost sure she 
smiled at me and was going to speak. And then— 
then—she was gone!” 

“I didn’t know until my wife screamed,” added the 
man. “I was seated facing her at the time. I ran 
to the rail and could see nothing behind but the wash 
of the ship. I think she went down instantly.” 

Alan turned. He thrust himself silently through a 
crowd of excited and questioning people, but he did not 
hear their questions and scarcely sensed the presence of 
their voices. His desire to make great haste had left 
him, and he walked calmly and deliberately to the 
cabin where Mary Standish would be if the woman was 
mistaken, and it was not she who had leaped into the 
sea. He knocked at the door only once. Then he 
opened it. There was no cry of fear or protest from 
within, and he knew the room was empty before he 
turned on the electric light. He had known it from the 


IOO 


THE ALASKAN 

beginning, from the moment he heard the woman's 
scream. Mary Standish was gone. 

He looked at her bed. There was the depression 
made by her head in the pillow. A little handkerchief 
lay on the coverlet, crumpled and twisted. Her few 
possessions were arranged neatly on the reading table. 
Then he saw her shoes and her stockings, and a dress 
on the bed, and he picked up one of the shoes and 
held it in a cold, steady hand. It was a little shoe. His 
fingers closed about it until it crushed like paper. 

He was holding it when he heard someone behind 
him, and he turned slowly to confront Captain Rifle. 
The little man’s face was like gray wax. For a mo¬ 
ment neither of them spoke. Captain Rifle looked at 
the shoe crumpled in Alan’s hand. 

‘‘The boats got away quickly,” he said in a husky 
voice. “We stopped inside the third-mile. If she 
can swim—there is a chance.” 

“She won’t swim,” replied Alan. “She didn’t jump 
in for that. She is gone.” 

In a vague and detached sort of way he was sur¬ 
prised at the calmness of his own voice. Captain Rifle 
saw the veins standing out on his clenched hands and in 
his forehead. Through many years he had witnessed 
tragedy of one kind and another. It was not strange 
to him. But a look of wonderment shot into his eyes 
at Alan’s words. It took only a few seconds to tell 
what had happened the preceding night, without going 
into details. The captain’s hand was on Alan’s arm 


THE ALASKAN 


IOI 


when he finished, and the flesh under his fingers 
was rigid and hard as steel. 

“We’ll talk with Rossland after the boats return,” 
he said. 

He drew Alan from the room and closed the door. 

Not until he had reentered his own cabin did Alan 
realize he still held the crushed shoe in his hand. He 
placed it on his bed and dressed. It took him only a 
few minutes. Then he went aft and found the captain. 
Half an hour later the first boat returned. Five minutes 
after that, a second came in. And then a third. Alan 
stood back, alone, while the passengers crowded the 
rail. He knew what to expect. And the murmur of 
it came to him—failure! It was like a sob rising 
softly out of the throats of many people. He drew 
away. He did not want to meet their eyes, or talk with 
them, or hear the things they would be saying. And as 
he went, a moan came to his lips, a strangled cry filled 
with an agony which told him he was breaking down. 
He dreaded that. It was the first law of his kind to 
stand up under blows, and he fought against the desire 
to reach out his arms to the sea and entreat Mary 
Standish to rise up out of it and forgive him. 

He drove himself on like a mechanical thing. His 
white face was a mask through which burned no sign 
of his grief, and in his eyes was a deadly coldness. 
Heartless, the woman who had screamed might have 
said. And she would have been right. His heart was 
gone. 


102 


THE ALASKAN 

Two people were at Rossland’s door when he came 
up. One was Captain Rifle, the other Marston, the 
ship’s doctor. The captain was knocking when Alan 
joined them. He tried the door. It was locked. 

“I can’t rouse him,” he said. “And I did not see 
him among the passengers.” 

“Nor did I,” said Alan. 

Captain Rifle fumbled with his master key. 

“I think the circumstances permit,” he explained. 
In a moment he looked up, puzzled. “The door is 
locked on the inside, and the key is in the lock.” 

He pounded with his fist on the panel. He continued 
to pound until his knuckles were red. There was still 
no response. 

“Odd,” he muttered. 

“Very odd,” agreed Alan. 

His shoulder was against the door. He drew back 
and with a single crash sent it in. A pale light filtered 
into the room from a corridor lamp, and the men 
stared. Rossland was in bed. They could see his 
face dimly, upturned, as if staring at the ceiling. But 
even now he made no movement and spoke no word. 
Marston entered and turned on the light. 

After that, for ten seconds, no man moved. Then 
Alan heard Captain Rifle close the door behind them, 
and from Marston’s lips came a startled whisper: 

“Good God!” 

Rossland was not covered. He was undressed and 
flat on his back. His arms were stretched out, his 


THE ALASKAN 


103 

head thrown back, his mouth agape. And the white 
sheet under him was red with blood. It had trickled 
over the edges and to the floor. His eyes were loosely 
closed. After the first shock Doctor Marston reacted 
swiftly. He bent over Rossland, and in that moment, 
when his back was toward them, Captain Rifle’s eyes 
met Alan’s. The same thought—and in another instant 
disbelief—flashed from one to the other. 

Marston was speaking, professionally cool now. 
“A knife stab, close to the right lung, if not in it. And 
an ugly bruise over his eye. He is not dead. Let him 
lie as he is until I return with instruments and dress- 

■ _ ff 

ing. 

“The door was locked on the inside,” said Alan, 
as soon as the doctor was gone. “And the window 
is closed. It looks like—suicide. It is possible—there 
was an understanding between them—and Rossland 
chose this way instead of the sea?” 

Captain Rifle was on his knees. He looked under 
the berth, peered into the comers, and pulled back 
the blanket and sheet. “There is no knife,” he said 
stonily. And in a moment he added: “There are red 
stains on the window. It was not attempted suicide. 
It was—” 

“Murder.” 

“Yes, if Rossland dies. It was done through the 
open window. Someone called Rossland to the win¬ 
dow, struck him, and then closed the window. Or 
it is possible, if he were sitting or standing here, that 


104 THE ALASKAN 

a long-armed man might have reached him. It was 
a man, Alan. We’ve got to believe that. It was a 
man”\ 

“Of course, a man,” Alan nodded. 

They could hear Marston returning, and he was not 
alone. Captain Rifle made a gesture toward the door. 
“Better go,” he advised. “This is a ship’s matter, and 
you won’t want to be unnecessarily mixed up in it. 
Come to my cabin in half an hour. I shall want to 
see you.” 

The second officer and the purser were with Doctor 
Marston when Alan passed them, and he heard the 
door of Rossland’s room close behind him. The ship 
was trembling under his feet again. They were mov¬ 
ing away. He went to Mary Standish’s cabin and 
deliberately gathered her belongings and put them in 
the small handbag with which she had come aboard. 
Without any effort at concealment he carried the bag 
to his room and packed his own dunnage. After that 
he hunted up Stampede Smith and explained to him 
that an unexpected change in his plans compelled them 
to stop at Cordova. He was five minutes late in his 
appointment with the captain. 

Captain Rifle was seated at his desk when Alan 
entered his cabin. He nodded toward a chair. 

“We’ll reach Cordova inside of an hour,” he said. 
“Doctor Marston says Rossland will live, but of course 
we can not hold the Nome in port until he is able to 


THE ALASKAN 


105 

talk. He was struck through the window. I will make 
oath to that. Have you anything—in mind ?” 

“Only one thing,” replied Alan, “a determination 
to go ashore as soon as I can. If it is possible, I shall 
recover her body and care for it. As for Rossland, it 
is not a matter of importance to me whether he lives 
or dies. Mary Standish had nothing to do with the 
assault upon him. It was merely coincident with her 
own act and nothing more. Will you tell me our lo¬ 
cation when she leaped into the sea.” 

He was fighting to retain, his calmness, his resolution 
not to let Captain Rifle see clearly what the tragedy 
of her death had meant to him. 

“We were seven miles off the Eyak River coast, a 
little south and west. If her body goes ashore, it will 
be on the island, or the mainland east of Eyak River. I 
am glad you are going to make an effort. There is a 
chance. And I hope you will find her.” 

Captain Rifle rose from his chair and walked 
nervously back and forth. “It’s a bad blow for the 
ship—her first trip,” he said. “But I’m not thinking 
of the Nome. I’m thinking of Mary Standish. My 
God, it is terrible! If it had been anyone else— any¬ 
one —” His words seemed to choke him, and he made 
a despairing gesture with his hands. “It is hard to 
believe—almost impossible to believe she would de¬ 
liberately kill herself. Tell me again what happened 
in your cabin.” 

Crushing all emotion out of his voice, Alan repeated 


106 THE ALASKAN 

briefly certain details of the girl’s visit. But a number 
of things which she had trusted to his confidence he 
did not betray. He did not dwell upon Rossland’s in¬ 
fluence or her fear of him. Captain Rifle saw his 
effort, and when he had finished, he gripped his hand, 
understanding in his eyes. 

“You’re not responsible—not so much as you 
believe,” he said. “Don’t take it too much to heart, 
Alan. But find her. Find her if you can, and let me 
know. You will do that—you will let me know?” 

“Yes, I shall let you know.” 

“And Rossland. He is a man with many enemies. 
I am positive his assailant is still on board.” 

“Undoubtedly.” 

The captain hesitated. He did not look at Alan as 
he said: “There is nothing in Miss Standish’s room. 
Even her bag is gone. I thought I saw things in there 
when I was with you. I thought I saw something in 
your hand. But I must have been mistaken. She 
probably flung everything into the sea—before she 
went.” 

“Such a thought is possible,” agreed Alan evasively. 

Captain Rifle drummed the top of his desk with his 
finger-tips. His face looked haggard and old in the 
shaded light of the cabin. “That’s all, Alan. God 
knows I’d give this old life of mine to bring her back 
if I could. To me she was much like—someone—a 
long time dead. That’s why I broke ship’s regulations 
When she came aboard so strangely at Seattle, with- 


THE ALASKAN 


io t 

out reservation. I’m sorry now. I should have sent her 
ashore. But she is gone, and it is best that you and I 
keep to ourselves a little of what we guess. I hope you 
will find her, and if you do—” 

“I shall send you word.” 

They shook hands, and Captain Rifle’s fingers still 
held to Alan’s as they went to the door and opened it. 
A swift change had come in the sky. The stars were 
gone, and a moaning whisper hovered over the darkened 
sea. 

“A thunder-storm,” said the captain. 

His mastery was gone, his shoulders bent, and there 
was a tremulous note in his voice that compelled Alan 
to look straight out into darkness. And then he said, 

“Rossland will be sent to the hospital in Cordova, 
if he lives.” 

Alan made no answer. The door closed softly 
behind him, and slowly he went through gloom to the 
rail of the ship, and stood there, with the whispered 
moaning of the sea coming to him out of a pit of 
darkness. A vast distance away he heard a low intona¬ 
tion of thunder. 

He struggled to keep hold of himself as he returned 
to his cabin. Stampede Smith was waiting for him, 
his dunnage packed in an oilskin bag. Alan explained 
the unexpected change in his plans. Business in Cor¬ 
dova would make him miss a boat and would delay him 
at least a month in reaching the tundras. It was neces¬ 
sary for Stampede to go on to the range alone. He 


io8 THE ALASKAN 

could make a quick trip by way of the Government 
railroad to Tanana. After that he would go to Alla- 
kakat, and thence still farther north into the Endicott 
country. It would be easy for a man like Stampede 
to find the range. He drew a map, gave him certain 
written instructions, money, and a final warning not to 
lose his head and take up gold-hunting on the way. 
While it was necessary for him to go ashore at once, 
he advised Stampede not to leave the ship until morn¬ 
ing. And Stampede swore on oath he would not fail 
him. 

Alan did not explain his own haste and was glad 
Captain Rifle had not questioned him too closely. He 
was not analyzing the reasonableness of his action. 
He only knew that every muscle in his body was ach¬ 
ing for physical action and that he must have it im¬ 
mediately or break. The desire was a touch of mad¬ 
ness in his blood, a thing which he was holding back 
by sheer force of will. He tried to shut out the vision 
of a pale face floating in the sea; he fought to keep 
a grip on the dispassionate calmness which was a part 
of him. But the ship itself was battering down his 
stoic resistance. In an hour—since he had heard the 
scream of the woman—he had come to hate it. He 
wanted the feel of solid earth under his feet. He 
wanted, with all his soul, to reach that narrow strip 
of coast where Mary Standish was drifting in. 

But even Stampede saw no sign of the fire that was 
consuming him. And not until Alan’s feet touched 


THE ALASKAN 


109 

land, and Cordova lay before him like a great hole in 
the mountains, did the strain give way within him. 
After he had left the wharf, he stood alone in the dark¬ 
ness, breathing deeply of the mountain smell and get¬ 
ting his bearings. It was more than darkness about 
him. An occasional light burning dimly here and there 
gave to it the appearance of a sea of ink threatening to 
inundate him. The storm had not broken, but it was 
close, and the air was filled with a creeping warning. 
The moaning of thunder was low, and yet very near, 
as if smothered by the hand of a mighty force prepar¬ 
ing to take the earth unaware. 

Through the pit of gloom Alan made his way. He 
was not lost. Three years ago he had walked a score 
of times to the cabin of old Olaf Ericksen, half a mile 
up the shore, and he knew Ericksen would still be 
there, where he had squatted for twenty years, and 
where he had sworn to stay until the sea itself was 
ready to claim him. So he felt his way instinctively, 
while a crash of thunder broke over his head. The 
forces of the night were unleashing. He could hear 
a gathering tumult in the mountains hidden beyond 
the wall of blackness, and there came a sudden glare 
of lightning that illumined his way. It helped him. He 
saw a white reach of sand ahead and quickened his 
steps. And out of the sea he heard more distinctly 
an increasing sound. It was as if he walked between 
two great armies that were setting earth and sea atrem- 
ble as they advanced to deadly combat. 


no THE ALASKAN 

The lightning came again, and after it followed a 
discharge of thunder that gave to the ground under his 
feet a shuddering tremor. It rolled away, echo upon 
echo, through the mountains, like the booming of 
signal-guns, each more distant than the other. A cold 
breath of air struck Alan in the face, and something 
inside him rose up to meet the thrill of storm. 

He had always loved the rolling echoes of thunder 
in the mountains and the fire of lightning among their 
peaks. On such a night, with the crash of the elements 
about his father’s cabin and the roaring voices of the 
ranges filling the darkness with tumult, his mother had 
brought him into the world. Love of it was in his 
blood, a part of his soul, and there were times when he 
yearned for this “talk of the mountains” as others 
yearn for the coming of spring. He welcomed it now 
as his eyes sought through the darkness for a glimmer 
of the light that always burned from dusk until dawn 
in Olaf Ericksen’s cabin. 

He saw it at last, a yellow eye peering at him through 
a slit in an inky wall. A moment later the darker 
shadow of the cabin rose up in his face, and a flash 
of lightning showed him the door. In a moment of 
silence he could hear the patter of huge raindrops on 
the roof as he dropped his bags and began hammering 
with his fist to arouse the Swede. Then he flung 
open the unlocked door and entered, tossing his dun¬ 
nage to the floor, and shouted the old greeting that 
Ericksen would not have forgotten, though nearly a 


THE ALASKAN 


hi 


quarter of a century had passed since he and Alan’s 
father had tramped the mountains together. 

He had turned up the wick of the oil lamp on the 
table when into the frame of an inner door came 
Ericksen himself, with his huge, bent shoulders, his 
massive head, his fierce eyes, and a great gray beard 
streaming over his naked chest. He stared for a mo¬ 
ment, and Alan flung off his hat, and as the storm 
broke, beating upon the cabin in a mighty shock of 
thunder and wind and rain, a bellow of recognition 
came from Ericksen. They gripped hands. 

The Swede’s voice rose above wind and rain and the 
rattle of loose windows, and he was saying something 
about three years ago and rubbing the sleep from his 
eyes, when the strange look in Alan’s face made him 
pause to hear other words than his own. 

Five minutes later he opened a door looking out over 
the black sea, bracing his arm against it. The wind 
tore in, beating his whitening beard over his shoulders, 
and with it came a deluge of rain that drenched him as 
he stood there. He forced the door shut and faced 
Alan, a great, gray ghost of a man in the yellow glow 
of the oil lamp. 

From then until dawn they waited. And in the first 
break of that dawn the long, black launch of Olaf, the 
Swede, nosed its way steadily out to sea. 


CHAPTER X 


T HE wind had died away, but the rain continued, 
torrential in its downpour, and the mountains 
grumbled with dying thunder. The town was blotted 
out, and fifty feet ahead of the hissing nose of the 
launch Alan could see only a gray wall. Water ran 
in streams from his rubber slicker, and Olaf’s great 
beard was dripping like a wet rag. He was like a 
huge gargoyle at the wheel, and in the face of impene¬ 
trable gloom he opened speed until the Norden was 
shooting with the swiftness of a torpedo through the 
sea. 

In Olaf’s cabin Alan had listened to the folly of ex¬ 
pecting to find Mary Standish. Between Eyak River 
and Katalla was a mainland of battered reefs and rocks 
and an archipelago of islands in which a pirate fleet 
might have found a hundred hiding-places. In his 
experience of twenty years Ericksen had never known 
of the finding of a body washed ashore, and he stated 
firmly his belief that the girl was at the bottom of 
the sea. But the impulse to go on grew no less in 
Alan. It quickened with the straining eagerness of the 
Norden as the slim craft leaped through the water. 
Even the drone of thunder and the beat of rain urged 
112 


THE ALASKAN 


113 

him on. To him there was nothing absurd in the quest 
he was about to make. It was the least he could do, 
and the only honest thing he could do, he kept 
telling himself. And there was a chance that he 
would find her. All through his life had run that 
element of chance; usually it was against odds he had 
won, and there rode with him in the gray dawn a con¬ 
viction he was going to win now—that he would find 
Mary Standish somewhere in the sea or along the coast 
between Eyak River and the first of the islands against 
which the shoreward current drifted. And when he 
found her— 

He had not gone beyond that. But it pressed upon 
him now, and in moments it overcame him, and he 
saw her in a way which he was fighting to keep out 
of his mind. Death had given a vivid clearness to 
his mental pictures of her. A strip of white beach 
persisted in his mind, and waiting for him on this beach 
was the slim body of the girl, her pale face turned 
up to the morning sun, her long hair streaming over 
the sand. It was a vision that choked him, and he 
struggled to keep away from it. If he found her like 
that, he knew, at last, what he would do. It was the 
final crumbling away of something inside him, the 
breaking down of that other Alan Holt whose negative 
laws and self-imposed blindness had sent Mary Stand¬ 
ish to her death. 

Truth seemed to mock at him, flaying him for that 
invulnerable poise in which he had taken such an ego- 


114 THE ALASKAN 

tistical pride. For she had come to him in her hour of 
trouble, and there were five hundred others aboard the 
Nome . She had believed in him, had given him her 
friendship and her confidence, and at the last had placed 
her life in his hands. And when he had failed her, 
she had not gone to another. She had kept her word, 
proving to him she was not a liar and a fraud, and he 
knew at last the courage of womanhood and the truth 
of her words, “You will understand—tomorrow.” 

He kept the fight within himself. Olaf did not see 
it as the dawn lightened swiftly into the beginning of 
day. There was no change in the tense lines of hi9 
face and the grim resolution in his eyes. And Olaf did 
not press his folly upon him, but kept the Norden 
pointed seaward, adding still greater speed as the huge 
shadow of the headland loomed up in the direction of 
Hinchinbrook Island. With increasing day the rain 
subsided; it fell in a drizzle for a time and then stopped. 
Alan threw off his slicker and wiped the water from his 
eyes and hair. White mists began to rise, and through 
them shot faint rose-gleams of light. Olaf grunted 
approbation as he wrung water from his beard. The 
sun was breaking through over the mountain tops, and 
straight above, as the mist dissolved, was radiant blue 
sky. 

The miracle of change came swiftly in the next 
half-hour. Storm had washed the air until it was like 
tonic; a salty perfume rose from the sea; and Olaf 
stood up and stretched himself and shook the wet from 



THE j£ONG BLACK LAUNCH ^OSED ITS WAT OUT TO SEA 
















THE ALASKAN 


115 

his body as he drank the sweetness into his lungs. 
Shoreward Alan saw the mountains taking form, and 
one after another they rose up like living things, their 
crests catching the fire of the sun. Dark inundations 
of forest took up the shimmering gleam, green slopes 
rolled out from behind veils of smoking vapor, and 
suddenly—in a final triumph of the sun—the Alaskan 
coast lay before him in all its glory. 

The Swede made a great gesture of exultation with 
his free arm, grinning at his companion, pride and the 
joy of living in his bearded face. But in Alan’s there 
was no change. Dully he sensed the wonder of day and 
of sunlight breaking over the mighty ranges to the sea, 
but something was missing. The soul of it was gone, 
and the old thrill was dead. He felt the tragedy of it, 
and his lips tightened even as he met the other’s smile, 
for he no longer made an effort to blind himself to the 
truth. 

Olaf began to guess deeply at that truth, now that 
he could see Alan’s face in the pitiless light of the day, 
and after a little the thing lay naked in his mind. The 
quest was not a matter of duty, nor was it inspired 
by the captain of the Nome, as Alan had given him 
reason to believe. There was more than grimness in 
the other’s face, and a strange sort of sickness lay in 
his eyes. A little later he observed the straining eager¬ 
ness with which those eyes scanned the softly undu¬ 
lating surface of the sea. 


n6 


THE ALASKAN 


At last he said, “If Captain Rifle was right, the girl 
went overboard out there” and he pointed. 

Alan stood up. 

“But she wouldn’t be there now,” Olaf added. 

In his heart he believed she was, straight down—at 
the bottom. He turned his boat shoreward. Creeping 
out from the shadow of the mountains was the white 
sand of the beach three or four miles away. A quar¬ 
ter of an hour later a spiral of smoke detached itself 
from the rocks and timber that came down close to the 
sea. 

“That’s McCormick’s,” he said. 

Alan made no answer. Through Olaf’s binoculars 
he picked out the Scotchman’s cabin. It was Sandy 
McCormick, Olaf had assured him, who knew every 
eddy and drift in fifty miles of coast, and with his 
eyes shut could find Mary Standish if she came ashore. 
And it was Sandy who came down to greet them when 
Ericksen dropped his anchor in shallow water. 

They leaped out, thigh-deep, and waded to the beach, 
and in the door of the cabin beyond Alan saw a woman 
looking down at them wonderingly. Sandy himself 
was young and ruddy-faced, more like a boy than a 
man. They shook hands. Then Alan told of the 
tragedy aboard the Nome and what his mission was. 
He made a great effort to speak calmly, and believed 
that he succeeded. Certainly there was no break of 
emotion in his cold, even voice, and at the same time 
no possibility of evading its deadly earnestness. Me- 


THE ALASKAN 


ii 7 

Cormick, whose means of livelihood were frequently 
more unsubstantial than real, listened to the offer of 
pecuniary reward for his services with something like 
shock. Fifty dollars a day for his time, and an addi¬ 
tional five thousand dollars if he found the girl’s body. 

To Alan the sums meant nothing. He was not meas¬ 
uring dollars, and if he had said ten thousand or twenty 
thousand, the detail of price would not have impressed 
him as important. He possessed as much money as 
that in the Nome banks, and a little more, and had the 
thing been practicable he would as willingly have of¬ 
fered his reindeer herds could they have guaranteed 
him the possession of what he sought. In Olaf’s face 
McCormick caught a look which explained the situa¬ 
tion a little. Alan Holt was not mad. He was as any 
other man might be who had lost the most precious 
thing in the world. And unconsciously, as he pledged 
his services in acceptance of the offer, he glanced in the 
direction of the little woman standing in the doorway 
of the cabin. 

Alan met her. She was a quiet, sweet-looking girl- 
woman. She smiled gravely at Olaf, gave her hand 
tG Alan, and her blue eyes dilated when she heard what 
had happened aboard the Nome . Alan left the three 
together and returned to the beach, while between the 
loading and the lighting of his pipe the Swede told 
what he had guessed—that this girl whose body would 
never be washed ashore was the beginning and the end 
of the world to Alan Holt. 


Ii8 THE ALASKAN 

For many miles they searched the beach that day, 
while Sandy McCormick skirmished among the islands 
south and eastward in a light shore-launch. He was, 
in a way, a Paul Revere spreading intelligence, and 
with Scotch canniness made a good bargain for him¬ 
self. In a dozen cabins he left details of the drowning 
and offered a reward of five hundred dollars for th* 
finding of the body, so that twenty men and boys and 
half as many women were seeking before nightfall. 

“And remember,” Sandy told each of them, “the 
chances are she’ll wash ashore sometime between to¬ 
morrow and three days later, if she comes ashore 
at all.” 

In the dusk of that first day Alan found himself ten 
miles up the coast. He was alone, for Olaf Ericksen 
had gone in the opposite direction. It was a different 
Alan who watched the setting sun dipping into the 
western sea, with the golden slopes of the mountains 
reflecting its glory behind him. It was as if he had 
passed through a great sickness, and up from the earth 
of his own beloved land had crept slowly into his body 
and soul a new understanding of life. There was 
despair in his face, but it was a gentler thing now. 
The harsh lines of an obstinate will were gone from 
about his mouth, his eyes no longer concealed their 
grief, and there was something in his attitude of a man 
chastened by a consuming fire. He retraced his steps 
through deepening twilight, and with each mile of his 
questing return there grew in him that something which 


THE ALASKAN 


119 

had come to him out of death, and which he knew would 
never leave him. And with this change the droning 
softness of the night itself seemed to whisper that the 
sea would not give up its dead. 

Olaf and Sandy McCormick and Sandy’s wife were 
in the cabin when he returned at midnight. He was 
exhausted. Seven months in the States had softened 
him, he explained. He did not inquire how successful 
the others had been. He knew. The woman’s eyes 
told him, the almost mothering eagerness in them when 
he came through the door. She had coffee and food 
ready for him, and he forced himself to eat. Sandy 
gave a report of what he had done, and Olaf smoked 
his pipe and tried to speak cheerfully of the splendid 
weather that was coming tomorrow. Not one of them 
spoke of Mary Standish. 

Alan felt the strain they were under and knew his 
presence was the cause of it, so he lighted his own pipe 
after eating and talked to Ellen McCormick about the 
splendor of the mountains back of Eyak River, and 
how fortunate she was to have her home in this little 
comer of paradise. He caught a flash of something 
unspoken in her eyes. It was a lonely place for a 
woman, alone, without children, and he spoke about 
children to Sandy, smiling. They should have chil¬ 
dren—a lot of them. Sandy blushed, and Olaf let out 
a boom of laughter. But the woman’s face was un¬ 
flushed and serious; only her eyes betrayed her, some- 


120 THE ALASKAN 

thing wistful and appealing in them as she looked at 
Sandy. 

“We’re building a new cabin,” he said, “and there’s 
two rooms in it specially for kids.” 

There was pride in his voice as he made pretense 
to light a pipe that was already lighted, and pride in 
the look he gave his young wife. A moment later Ellen 
McCormick deftly covered with her apron something 
which lay on a little table near the door through which 
Alan had to pass to enter his sleeping-room. Olaf’s 
eyes twinkled. But Alan did not see. Only he knew 
there should be children here, where there was surely 
love. It did not occur to him as being strange that he, 
Alan Holt, should think of such a matter at all. 

The next morning the search was resumed. Sandy 
drew a crude map of certain hidden places up the east 
coast where drifts and cross-currents tossed the flotsam 
of the sea, and Alan set out for these shores with Olaf 
at the wheel of the Nor den. It was sunset when they 
returned, and in the calm of a wonderful evening, with 
the comforting peace of the mountains smiling down 
at them, Olaf believed the time had come to speak what 
was in his mind. He spoke first of the weird tricks of 
the Alaskan waters, and of strange forces deep down 
under the surface which he had never had explained 
to him, and of how he had lost a cask once upon a time, 
and a week later had run upon it well upon -its way to 
Japan. He emphasized the hide-and-seek playfulness 
of the undertows and the treachery of them. 


THE ALASKAN 


121 


Then he came bluntly to the point of the matter. It 
would be better if Mary Standish never did come 
ashore. It would be days—probably weeks—if it ever 
happened at all, and there would be nothing about her 
for Alan to recognize. Better a peaceful resting-place 
at the bottom of the sea. That was what he called 
it—“a peaceful resting-place”—and in his earnestness 
to soothe another’s grief he blundered still more deeply 
into the horror of it all, describing certain details of 
what flesh and bone could and could not stand, until 
Alan felt like clubbing him beyond the power of speech. 
He was glad when he saw the McCormick cabin. 

Sandy was waiting for them when they waded 
ashore. Something unusual was in his face, Alan 
thought, and for a moment his heart waited in suspense. 
But the Scotchman shook his head negatively and went 
close to Olaf Ericksen. Alan did not see the look that 
passed between them. He went to the cabin, and Ellen 
McCormick put a hand on his arm when he entered. It 
was an unusual thing for her to do. And there was 
a glow in her eyes which had not been there last night, 
and a flush in her cheeks, and a new, strange note in 
her voice when she spoke to him. It was almost exulta¬ 
tion, something she was trying to keep back. 

“You—you didn’t find her?” she asked. 

“No.” His voice was tired and a little old, “Do 
you think I shall ever find her ?” 

“Not as you have expected,” she answered quietly. 
“She will never come like that.” She seemed to be 


122 


THE ALASKAN 

making an effort. "You—you would give a great deal 
to have her back, Mr. Holt?” 

Her question was childish in its absurdity, and she 
was like a child looking at him as she did in this mo¬ 
ment. He forced a smile to his lips and nodded. 

"Of course. Everything I possess.” 

"You—you—loved her—” 

Her voice trembled. It was odd she should ask these 
questions. But the probing did not sting him; it was 
not a woman’s curiosity that inspired them, and the 
comforting softness in her voice did him good. He 
had not realized before how much he wanted to answer 
that question, not only for himself, but for someone 
else—aloud. 

"Yes, I did.” 

The confession almost startled him. It seemed an 
amazing confidence to be making under any circum¬ 
stances, and especially upon such brief acquaintance. 
But he said no more, though in Ellen McCormick’s 
face and eyes was a tremulous expectancy. He stepped 
into the little room which had been his sleeping place, 
and returned with his dunnage-sack. Out of this he 
took the bag in which were Mary Standish’s belong¬ 
ings, and gave it to Sandy’s wife. It was a matter of 
business now, and he tried to speak in a businesslike 
way. 

"Her things are inside. I got them in her cabin. 
If you find her, after I am gone, you will need them. 
You understand, of course. And if you don’t find her, 


THE ALASKAN 


123 

keep them for me. I shall return some day.” It 
seemed hard for him to give his simple instructions. 
He went on: “I don’t think I shall stay any longer, 
but I will leave a certified check at Cordova, and it 
will be turned over to your husband when she is found. 
And if you do find her, you will look after her your- 5 
self, won’t you, Mrs. McCormick ?” 

Ellen McCormick choked a little as she answered 
him, promising to do what he asked. He would always 
remember her as a sympathetic little thing, and half an 
hour later, after he had explained everything to Sandy, 
he wished her happiness when he took her hand in say¬ 
ing good-by. Her hand was trembling. He wondered 
at it and said something to Sandy about the priceless 
value of a happiness such as his, as they went down 
to the beach. 

The velvety darkness of the sky was athrob with 
the heart-beat of stars, when the Norderis shimmering 
trail led once more out to sea. Alan looked up at them, 
and his mind groped strangely in the infinity that lay 
above him. He had never measured it before. Life 
had been too full. But now it seemed so vast, and 
his range in the tundras so far away, that a great lone¬ 
liness seized upon him as he turned his eyes to look 
back at the dimly white shore-line dissolving swiftly 
in the gloom that lay beneath the mountains. 


CHAPTER XI 


T HAT night, in Olaf’s cabin, Alan put himself back 
on the old track again. He made no effort to 
minimize the tragedy that had come into his life, and 
he knew its effect upon him would never be wiped 
away, and that Mary Standish would always live in his 
thoughts, no matter what happened in the years to 
come. But he was not the sort to let any part of him¬ 
self wither up and die because of a blow that had 
darkened his mental visions of things. His plans lay 
ahead of him, his old ambitions and his dreams of 
achievement. They seemed pulseless and dead now, but 
he knew it was because his own fire had temporarily 
burned out. And he realized the vital necessity of 
building it up again. So he first wrote a letter to Ellen 
McCormick, and in this placed a second letter—care¬ 
fully sealed—which was not to be opened unless they 
found Mary Standish, and which contained something 
he had found impossible to put into words in Sandy’s 
cabin. It was trivial and embarrassing when spoken 
to others, but it meant a great deal to him. Then he 
made the final arrangements for Olaf to carry him to 
Seward in the Norden, for Captain Rifle’s ship was 
well on her way to Unalaska. Thought of Captain 


THE ALASKAN 125 

Rifle urged him to write another letter in which he 
told briefly the disappointing details of his search. 

He was rather surprised the next morning to find 
he had entirely forgotten Rossland. While he was at¬ 
tending to his affairs at the bank, Olaf secured infor¬ 
mation that Rossland was resting comfortably in the 
hospital and had not one chance in ten of dying. It 
was not Alan’s intention to see him. He wanted to 
hear nothing he might have to say about Mary Stand- 
ish. To associate them in any way*, as he thought of 
her now, was little short of sacrilege. He was con¬ 
scious of the change in himself, for it was rather an 
amazing upsetting of the original Alan Holt. That 
person would have gone to Rossland with the deliberate 
and businesslike intention of sifting the matter to the 
bottom that he might disprove his own responsibility 
and set himself right in his own eyes. In self-defense 
he would have given Rossland an opportunity to break 
down with cold facts the disturbing something which 
his mind had unconsciously built up. But the new 
Alan revolted. He wanted to carry the thing away 
with him, he wanted it to live, and so it went with him, 
uncontaminated by any truths or lies which Rossland 
might have told him. 

They left Cordova early in the afternoon, and at 
sunset that evening camped on the tip of a wooded 
island a mile or two from the mainland. Olaf knew 
the island and had chosen it for reasons of his own. 
It was primitive and alive with birds. Olaf loved the 


126 THE ALASKAN 

birds, and the cheer of their vesper song and bedtime 
twitter comforted Alan. He seized an ax, and for the 
first time in seven months his muscles responded to 
the swing of it. And Ericksen, old as his years in the 
way of the north, whistled loudly and rumbled a bit of 
crude song through his beard as he lighted a fire, know¬ 
ing the medicine of the big open was getting its hold 
on Alan again. To Alan it was like coming to the 
edge of home once more. It seemed an age, an infinity, 
since he had heard the sputtering of bacon in an open 
skillet and the bubbling of coffee over a bed of coals 
with the mysterious darkness of the timber gathering 
in about him. He loaded his pipe after his chopping, 
and sat watching Olaf as he mothered the half-baked 
bannock loaf. It made him think of his father. A 
thousand times the two must have camped like this in 
the days when Alaska was new and there were no maps 
to tell them what lay beyond the next range. 

Olaf felt resting upon him something of the re¬ 
sponsibility of a doctor, and after supper he sat with 
his back to a tree and talked of the old days as if 
they were yesterday and the day before, with tomorrow 
always the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow which 
he had pursued for thirty years. He was sixty just a 
week ago this evening, he said, and he was beginning 
to doubt if he would remain on the beach at Cordova 
much longer. Siberia was dragging him—that forbid¬ 
den world of adventure and mystery and monumental 
opportunity which lay only a few miles across the strait 


THE ALASKAN 


127 

from the Seward Peninsula. In his enthusiasm he 
forgot Alan’s tragedy. He cursed Cossack law and 
the prohibitory measures to keep Americans out. More 
gold was over there than had ever been dreamed of in 
Alaska; even the mountains and rivers were unnamed; 
and he was going if he lived another year or two— 
going to find his fortune or his end in the Stanovoi 
Mountains and among the Chukchi tribes. Twice he 
had tried it since his old comrade had died, and twice 
he had been driven out. The next time he would know 
how to go about it, and he invited Alan to go with him. 

There was a thrill in this talk of a land so near, 
scarcely a night ride across the neck of Bering Sea, 
and yet as proscribed as the sacred plains of Tibet 
It stirred old desires in Alan’s blood, for he knew that 
of all frontiers the Siberian would be the last and the 
greatest, and that not only men, but nations, would 
play their part in the breaking of it. He saw the red 
gleam of firelight in Olaf’s eyes. 

“And if we don’t go in first from this side, Alan, the 
yellow fellows will come out some day from that” 
rumbled the old sour-dough, striking his pipe in the 
hollow of his hand. “And when they do, they won’t 
come over to us in ones an’ twos an’ threes, but in 
millions. That’s what the yellow fellows will do when 
they once get started, an’ it’s up to a few Alaska Jacks 
an’ Tough-Nut Bills to get their feet planted first on 
the other side. Will you go?” 


128 THE ALASKAN 

Alan shook his head. “Some day—but not now. 
The old flash was in his eyes and he was seeing the 
fight ahead of him again—the fight to do his bit in 
striking the shackles of misgovernment from Alaska 
and rousing the world to an understanding of the 
menace which hung over her like a smoldering cloud. 
“But you’re right about the danger,” he said. “It 
won’t come from Japan to California. It will pour like 
a flood through Siberia and jump to Alaska in a night. 
It isn’t the danger of the yellow man alone, Olaf. 
You’ve got to combine that with Bolshevism, the men¬ 
ace of blackest Russia. A disease which, if it crosses 
the little neck of water and gets hold of Alaska, will 
shake the American continent to bed-rock. It may be 
a generation from now, maybe a century, but it’s com¬ 
ing sure as God makes light—if we let Alaska go down 
and out. And my way of preventing it is different 
from yours.” 

He stared into the fire, watching the embers flare up 
and die. “I’m not proud of the States,” he went on, 
as if speaking to something which he saw in the flames. 
“I can’t be, after the ruin their unintelligent propa¬ 
ganda and legislation have brought upon Alaska. But 
they’re our salvation and conditions are improving. I 
concede we have factions in Alaska and we are not at 
all unanimous in what we want. It’s going to be largely 
a matter of education. We can’t take Alaska down 
to the States—we’ve got to bring them up to us. We 
must make a large part of a hundred and ten 


THE ALASKAN 


129 

million Americans understand. We must bring a mil¬ 
lion of them up here before that danger-flood we speak 
of comes beyond the Gulf of Anadyr. It’s God’s own 
country we have north of Fifty-eight, Olaf. And we 
have ten times the wealth of California. We can care 
for a million people easily. But bad politics and bad 
judgment both here in Alaska and at Washington 
won’t let them come. With coal enough under our 
feet to last a thousand years, we are buying fuel from 
the States. We’ve got billions in copper and oil, but 
can’t touch them. We should have some of the world’s 
greatest manufacturing plants, but we can not, because 
everything up here is locked away from us. I repeat 
that isn’t conservation. If they had applied a little of 
it to the salmon industry—but they didn’t. And the 
salmon are going, like the buffalo of the plains. 

“The destruction of the salmon shows what will hap¬ 
pen to us if the bars are let down all at once to the 
financial banditti. Understanding and common sense 
must guard the gates. The fight we must win is to 
bring about an honest and reasonable adjustment, Olaf. 
And that fight will take place right here—in Alaska— 
and not in Siberia. And if we don’t win—” 

He raised his eyes from the fire and smiled grimly 
into Olaf’s bearded face. 

“Then we can count on that thing coming across the 
neck of sea from the Gulf of Anadyr,” he finished. 
“And if it ever does come, the people of the States 


130 THE ALASKAN 

will at last face the tragic realization of what Alaska 
could have meant to the nation.” 

The force of the old spirit surged uppermost in Alan 
again, and after that, for an hour or more, something 
lived for him in the glow of the fire which Olaf kept 
burning. It was the memory of Mary Standish, her 
quiet, beautiful eyes gazing at him, her pale face taking 
form in the lacy wisps of birch-smoke. His mind pio 
tured her in the flame-glow as she had listened to him 
that day in Skagway, when he had told her of this 
fight that was ahead. And it pleased him to think 
she would have made this same fight for Alaska if 
she had lived. It was a thought which brought a pain¬ 
ful thickening in his breath, for always these visions 
which Olaf could not see ended with Mary Standish as 
she had faced him in his cabin, her back against the 
door, her lips trembling, and her eyes softly radiant 
with tears in the broken pride of that last moment of 
her plea for life. 

He could not have told how long he slept that night. 
Dreams came to him in his restless slumber, and always 
they awakened him, so that he was looking at the stars 
again and trying not to think. In spite of the grief 
in his soul they were pleasant dreams, as though some 
gentle force were at work in him subconsciously to 
wipe away the shadows of tragedy. Mary Standish 
was with him again, between the mountains at Skag¬ 
way; she was at his side in the heart of the tundras, 
the sun in her shining hair and eyes, and all about 


THE ALASKAN 131 

them the wonder of wild roses and purple iris and 
white seas of sedge-cotton and yellow-eyed daisies, and 
birds singing in the gladness of summer. He heard 
the birds. And he heard the girl’s voice, answering 
them in her happiness and turning that happiness from 
the radiance of her eyes upon him. When he awoke, it 
was with a little cry, as if someone had stabbed him; 
and Olaf was building a fire, and dawn was breaking 
in rose-gleams over the mountains* 


CHAPTER XII 


T HIS first night and dawn in the heart of his wil¬ 
derness, with the new import of life gleaming 
down at him from the mighty peaks of the Chugach and 
Kenai ranges, marked the beginning of that uplift 
which drew Alan out of the pit into which he had 
fallen. He understood, now, how it was that through 
many long years his father had worshiped the mem¬ 
ory of a woman who had died, it seemed to him, an 
infinity ago. Unnumbered times he had seen the mir¬ 
acle of her presence in his father’s eyes, and once, 
when they had stood overlooking a sun-filled valley 
back in the mountains, the elder Holt had said: 

“Twenty-seven years ago the twelfth day of last 
month, mother went with me through this valley, Alan. 
Do you see the little bend in the creek, with the great 
rock in the sun? We rested there—before you were 
born!” 

He had spoken of that day as if it had been but yes¬ 
terday. And Alan recalled the strange happiness in his 
father’s face as he had looked down upon something in 
the valley which no other but himself could see. 

And it was happiness, the same strange, soul-aching 
happiness, that began to build itself a house close up 
against the grief in Alan’s heart. It would never be 
a house quite empty. Never again would he be alone. 
132 


THE ALASKAN 


133 

He knew at last it was an undying part of him, as it 
had been a part of his father, clinging to him in sweet 
pain, encouraging him, pressing gently upon him the 
beginning of a great faith that somewhere beyond was 
a place to meet again. In the many days that followed, 
it grew in him, but in a way no man or woman could 
see. It was a secret about which he built a wall, set¬ 
ting it apart from that stoical placidity of his nature 
which some people called indifference. Olaf could see 
farther than others, because he had known Alan’s father 
as a brother. It had always been that way with the 
elder Holt—straight, clean, deep-breathing, and with a 
smile on his lips in times of hurt. Olaf had seen him 
face death like that. He had seen him rise up 
with awesome courage from the beautiful form that 
had turned to clay under his eyes, and fight forth 
again into a world burned to ashes. Something of that 
look which he had seen in the eyes of the father he saw 
in Alan’s, in these days when they nosed their way 
up the Alaskan coast together. Only to himself did 
Alan speak the name of Mary Standish, just as his 
father had kept Elizabeth Holt’s name sacred in his 
own heart. Olaf, with mildly casual eyes and strong 
in the possession of memories, observed how much 
alike they were, but discretion held his tongue, and he 
said nothing to Alan of many things that ran in his 
mind. 

He talked of Siberia—always of Siberia, and did not 
hurry on the way to Seward. Alan himself felt no 


134 THE ALASKAN 

great urge to make haste. The days were soft with 
the premature breath of summer. The nights were 
cold, and filled with stars. Day after day mountains 
hung about them like mighty castles whose battlements 
reached up into the cloud-draperies of the sky. They 
kept close to the mainland and among the islands, camp¬ 
ing early each evening. Birds were coming northward 
by the thousand, and each night Olaf’s camp-fire sent 
up the delicious aroma of flesh-pots and roasts. When 
at last they reached Seward, and the time came for 
Olaf to turn back, there was an odd blinking in the 
old Swede’s eyes, and as a final comfort Alan told him 
again that the day would probably come when he would 
go to Siberia with him. After that, he watched the 
Norden until the little boat was lost in the distance 
of the sea. 

Alone, Alan felt once more a greater desire to reach 
his own country. And he was fortunate. Two days 
after his arrival at Seward the steamer which carried 
mail and the necessities of life to the string of settle¬ 
ments reaching a thousand miles out into the Pacific 
left Resurrection Bay, and he was given passage. 
Thereafter the countless islands of the North Pacific 
drifted behind, while always northward were the gray 
cliffs of the Alaskan Peninsula, with the ramparted 
ranges beyond, glistening with glaciers, smoking with 
occasional volcanoes, and at times so high their snowy 
peaks were lost in the clouds. First touching the hatch¬ 
ery at Karluk and then the canneries at Uyak and 


THE ALASKAN 135 

Chignik, the mail boat visited the settlements on the 
Island of Unga, and thence covered swiftly the three 
hundred miles to Dutch Harbor and Unalaska. Again 
he was fortunate. Within a week he was berthed on a 
freighter, and on the twelfth day of June set foot in 
Nome. 

His home-coming was unheralded, but the little, gray 
town, with its peculiar, black shadowings, its sea of 
stove-pipes, and its two solitary brick chimneys, brought 
a lump of joy into his throat as he watched its grow¬ 
ing outlines from the small boat that brought him 
ashore. He could see one of the only two brick chim¬ 
neys in northern Alaska gleaming in the sun; beyond 
it, fifty miles away, were the ragged peaks of the Saw- 
Tooth Range, looking as if one might walk to them in 
half an hour, and over all the world between seemed 
to hover a misty gloom. But it was where he had 
lived, where happiness and tragedy and unforgetable 
memories had come to him, and the welcoming of its 
frame buildings, its crooked streets, and what to others 
might have been ugliness, was a warm and thrilling 
thing. For here were his people. Here were the men 
and women who were guarding the northern door of 
the world, an epic place, filled with strong hearts, 
courage, and a love of country as inextinguishable as 
one’s love of life. From this drab little place, shut out 
from all the world for half the year, young men and 
women went down to southern universities, to big 
dties, to the glamor and lure of “outside,” But 


*36 THE ALASKAN 

they always came back. Nome called them. Its loneli¬ 
ness in winter. Its gray gloom in springtime. Its glory 
in summer and autumn. It was the breeding-place 
of a new race of men, and they loved it as Alan loved 
it. To him the black wireless tower meant more than 
the Statue of Liberty, the three weather-beaten church 
spires more than the architectural colossi of New York 
and Washington. Beside one of the churches he had 
played as a boy. He had seen the steeples painted. He 
had helped make the crooked streets. And his mother 
had laughed and lived and died here, and his father’s 
footprints had been in the white sands of the beach 
when tents dotted the shore like gulls. 

When he stepped ashore, people stared at him and 
then greeted him. He was unexpected. And the sur¬ 
prise of his arrival added strength to the grip which 
men’s hands gave him. He had not heard voices like 
theirs down in the States, with a gladness in them that 
was almost excitement. Small boys ran up to his side, 
and with white men came the Eskimo, grinning and 
shaking his hands. Word traveled swiftly that Alan 
Holt had come back from the States. Before the day 
was over, it was on its way to Shelton and Candle and 
Keewalik and Kotzebue Sound. Such was the begin¬ 
ning of his home-coming. But ahead of the news of 
his arrival Alan walked up Front Street, stopped at 
Bahlke’s restaurant for a cup of coffee, and then 
dropped casually into Lomen’s offices in the Tin Bank 
Building. 


THE ALASKAN 


137 


For a week Alan remained in Nome. Carl Lomen 
had arrived a few days before, and his brothers were 
“in” from the big ranges over on the Choris Peninsula. 
It had been a good winter and promised to be a tre¬ 
mendously successful summer. The Lomen herds would 
exceed forty thousand head, when the final figures 
were in. A hundred other herds were prospering, and 
the Eskimo and Lapps were full-cheeked and plump 
with good feeding and prosperity. A third of a mil¬ 
lion reindeer were on the hoof in Alaska, and the 
breeders were exultant. Pretty good, when compared 
with the fact that in 1902 there were less than five 
thousand! In another twenty years there would be ten 
million. 

But with this prosperity of the present and still 
greater promise for the future Alan sensed the under¬ 
current of unrest and suspicion in Nome. After wait¬ 
ing and hoping through another long winter, with 
their best men fighting for Alaska’s salvation at Wash¬ 
ington, word was traveling from mouth to mouth, 
from settlement to settlement, and from range to range, 
that the Bureaucracy which misgoverned them from 
thousands of miles away was not lifting a hand to 
relieve them. Federal office-holders refused to sur¬ 
render their deadly power, and their strangling methods 
were to continue. Coal, which should cost ten dollars 
a ton if dug from Alaskan mines, would continue to 
cost forty dollars; cold storage from Nome would 
continue to be fifty-two dollars a ton, when it should 


13 8 THE ALASKAN 

be twenty. Commercial brigandage was still given let¬ 
ters of marque. Bureaus were fighting among them¬ 
selves for greater power, and in the turmoil Alaska 
was still chained like a starving man just outside the 
reach of all the milk and honey in a wonderful land. 
Pauperizing, degrading, actually killing, the political 
misrule that had already driven 25 per cent of Alaska’s 
population from their homes was to continue indefi¬ 
nitely. A President of the United States had prom¬ 
ised to visit the mighty land of the north and see with 
his own eyes. But would he come? There had been 
other promises, many of them, and promises had always 
been futile. But it was a hope that crept through 
Alaska, and upon this hope men whose courage never 
died began to build. Freedom was on its way, even if 
slowly. Justice must triumph ultimately, as it always 
triumphed. Rusty keys would at last be turned in the 
locks which had kept from Alaskans all the riches and 
resources of their country, and these men were de¬ 
termined to go on building against odds that they 
might be better prepared for that freedom of human 
endeavor when it came. 

In these days, when the fires of achievement needed 
to be encouraged, and not smothered, neither Alan nor 
Carl Lomen emphasized the menace of gigantic finan¬ 
cial interests like that controlled by John Graham— 
interests fighting to do away with the best friend 
Alaska ever had, the Biological Survey, and backing 
with all their power the ruinous legislation to put 


THE ALASKAN 


139 


Alaska in the control of a group of five men that an 
aggrandizement even more deadly than a suffocating 
policy of conservation might be more easily accom¬ 
plished. Instead, they spread the optimism of men 
possessed of inextinguishable faith. The blackest days 
were gone. Rifts were breaking in the clouds. Intelli¬ 
gence was creeping through, like rays of sunshine. The 
end of Alaska’s serfdom was near at hand. So they 
preached, and knew they were preaching truth, for 
what remained of Alaska’s men after years of hope¬ 
lessness and distress were fighting men. And the 
women who had remained with them were the mothers 
and wives of a new nation in the making. 

These mothers and wives Alan met during his week 
in Nome. He would have given his life if a few 
million people in the States could have known these 
women. Something would have happened then, and 
the sisterhood of half a continent—possessing the power 
of the ballot—would have opened their arms to them. 
Men like John Graham would have gone out of exist¬ 
ence; Alaska would have received her birthright. For 
these women were of the kind who greeted the sun 
each day, and the gloom of winter, with something 
greater than hope in their hearts. They, too, were 
builders. Fear of God and love of land lay deep 
in their souls, and side by side with their men-folk 
they went on in this epic struggle for the building 
of a nation at the top of the world. 


I 4 0 THE ALASKAN 

Many times during this week Alan felt it in his heart 
to speak of Mary Standish. But in the end, not even 
to Carl Lomen did word of her escape his lips. The 
passing of each day had made her more intimately a 
part of him, and a secret part. He could not tell 
people about her. He even made evasions when ques¬ 
tioned about his business and experiences at Cordova 
and up the coast. Curiously, she seemed nearer to him 
when he was away from other men and women. He 
remembered it had been that way with his father, who 
was always happiest when in the deep mountains or 
the unending tundras. And so Alan thrilled with an 
inner gladness when his business was finished and the 
day came for him to leave Nome. 

Carl Lomen went with him as far as the big herd 
on Choris Peninsula. For one hundred miles, up to 
Shelton, they rode over a narrow-gauge, four-foot 
railway on a hand-car drawn by dogs. And it seemed 
to Alan, at times, as though Mary Standish were with 
him, riding in this strange way through a great wilder¬ 
ness. He could see her. That was the strange thing 
which began to possess him. There were moments 
when her eyes were shining softly upon him, her lips 
smiling, her presence so real he might have spoken to 
her if Lomen had not been at his side. He did not 
fight against these visionings. It pleased him to think 
of her going with him into the heart of Alaska, riding 
the picturesque “pup-mobile,” losing herself in the 
mountains and in his tundras, with all the wonder and 


THE ALASKAN 


141 

glory of a new world breaking upon her a little at a 
time, like the unfolding of a great mystery. For there 
was both wonder and glory in these countless miles 
running ahead and drifting behind, and the miracle of 
northward-sweeping life. The days were long. Night, 
as Mary Standish had always known night, was gone. 
On the twentieth of June there were twenty hours of 
day, with a dim and beautiful twilight between the 
hours of eleven and one. Sleep was no longer a mat¬ 
ter of the rising and setting of the sun, but was regu¬ 
lated by the hands of the watch. A world frozen to 
the core for seven months was bursting open like a 
great flower. 

From Shelton, Alan and his companion visited the 
eighty or ninety people at Candle, and thence con¬ 
tinued down the Keewalik River to Keewalik, on 
Kotzebue Sound. A Lomen power-boat, run by Lapps, 
carried them to Choris Peninsula, where for a week 
Alan remained with Lomen and his huge herd of 
fifteen thousand reindeer. He was eager to go on, 
but tried to hide his impatience. Something was urg¬ 
ing him, whipping him on to greater haste. For the 
first time in months he heard the crackling thunder 
of reindeer hoofs, and the music of it was like a wild 
call from his own herds hurrying him home. He was 
glad when the week-end came and his business was 
done. The power-boat took him to Kotzebue. It was 
night, as his watch went, when Paul Davidovich started 
up the delta of the Kobuk River with him in a lighter- 


142 THE ALASKAN 

age company’s boat. But there was no darkness. In 
the afternoon of the fourth day they came to the Red¬ 
stone, two hundred miles above the mouth of the 
Kobuk as the river winds. They had supper together 
on the shore. After that Paul Davidovich turned 
back with the slow sweep of the current, waving his 
hand until he was out of sight. 

Not until the sound of the Russian’s motor-boat was 
lost in distance did Alan sense fully the immensity of 
the freedom that swept upon him. At last, after 
months that had seemed like so many years, he was 
alone . North and eastward stretched the unmarked 
trail which he knew so well, a hundred and fifty miles 
straight as a bird might fly, almost unmapped, unpeo¬ 
pled, right up to the doors of his range in the slopes of 
the Endicott Mountains. A little cry from his own 
lips gave him a start. It was as if he had called out 
aloud to Tautuk and Amuk Toolik, and to Keok and 
Nawadlook, telling them he was on his way home and 
would soon be there. Never had this hidden land 
which he had found for himself seemed so desirable as 
it did in this hour. There was something about it that 
was all-mothering, all-good, all-sweetly-comforting to 
that other thing which had become a part of him now. 
It was holding out its arms to him, understanding, 
welcoming, inspiring him to travel strongly and swiftly 
the space between. And he was ready to answer its 
call. 

He looked at his watch. It was five o’clock in the 


THE ALASKAN 


143 

afternoon. He had spent a long day with the Russian, 
but he felt no desire for rest or sleep. The musk-tang 
of the tundras, coming to him through the thin timber 
of the river-courses, worked like an intoxicant in his 
blood. It was the tundra he wanted, before he lay down 
upon his back with his face to the stars. He was eager 
to get away from timber and to feel the immeasurable 
space of the big country, the open country, about him. 
What fool had given to it the name of Barren Lands? 
What idiots people were to lie about it in that way 
on the maps! He strapped his pack over his shoulders 
and seized his rifle. Barren Lands! 

He set out, walking like a man in a race. And 
long before the twilight hours of sleep they were sweep¬ 
ing out ahead of him in all their glory—the Barren 
Lands of the map-makers, his paradise. On a knoll 
he stood in the golden sun and looked about him. He 
set his pack down and stood with bared head, a whis¬ 
pering of cool wind in his hair. If Mary Standish 
could have lived to see this! He stretched out his 
arms, as if pointing for her eyes to follow, and her 
name was in his heart and whispering on his silent 
lips. Immeasurable the tundras reached ahead of him 
—rolling, sweeping, treeless, green and golden and a 
glory of flowers, athrill with a life no forest land had 
ever known. Under his feet was a crush of forget-me- 
nots and of white and purple violets, their sweet per¬ 
fume filling his lungs as he breathed. Ahead of him 
lay a white sea of yellow-eyed daisies, with purple iris 


144 THE ALASKAN 

high as his knees in between, and as far as he could 
see, waving softly in the breeze, was the cotton-tufted 
sedge he loved. The pods were green. In a few days 
they would be opening, and the tundras would be white 
carpets. 

He listened to the call of life. It was about him 
everywhere, a melody of bird-life subdued and sleepy 
even though the sun was still warmly aglow in the sky. 
A hundred times he had watched this miracle of bird 
instinct, the going-to-bed of feathered creatures in the 
weeks and months when there was no real night. He 
picked up his pack and went on. From a pool hidden 
in the lush grasses of a distant hollow came to him 
the twilight honking of nesting geese and the quacking 
content of wild ducks. He heard the reed-like, musical 
notes of a lone “organ-duck” and the plaintive cries of 
plover, and farther out, where the shadows seemed 
deepening against the rim of the horizon, rose the 
harsh, rolling notes of cranes and the raucous cries 
of the loons. And then, from a clump of willows near 
him, came the chirping twitter of a thrush whose throat 
was tired for the day, and the sweet, sleepy evening 
song of a robin. Night! Alan laughed softly, the pale 
flush of the sun in his face. Bedtime! He looked at 
his watch. 

It was nine o’clock. Nine o’clock, and the flowers 
still answering to the glow of the sun! And the people 
down there—in the States—called it a frozen land, a 
hell of ice and snow at the end of the earth, a place of 


THE ALASKAN 


145 

the survival of the fittest! Well, to just such extremes 
had stupidity and ignorance gone through all the years 
of history, even though men called themselves super¬ 
creatures of intelligence and knowledge. It was humor¬ 
ous. And it was tragic. 

At last he came to a shining pool between two 
tufted ridges, and in this velvety hollow che twilight 
was gathering like a shadow in a cup. A little creek 
ran out of the pool, and here Alan gathered soft grass 
and spread out his blankets. A great stillness drew in 
about him, broken only by the old squaws and the 
loons. At eleven o’clock he could still see clearly the 
sleeping water-fowl on the surface of the pool. But 
the stars were appearing. It grew duskier, and the 
rose-tint of the sun faded into purple gloom as pale 
night drew near—four hours of rest that was neither 
darkness nor day. With a pillow of sedge and grass 
under his head he slept. 

The song and cry of bird-life wakened him, and at 
dawn he bathed in the pool, with dozens of fluffy, new¬ 
born ducks dodging away from him among the grasses 
and reeds. That day, and the next, and the day after 
that he traveled steadily into the heart of the tundra 
country, swiftly and almost without rest. It seemed 
to him, at last, that he must be in that country where 
all the bird-life of the world was born, for wherever 
there was water, in the pools and little streams and the 
hollows between the ridges, the voice of it in the morn¬ 
ing was a babel of sound. Out of the sweet breast of 


THE ALASKAN 


146 

the earth he could feel the irresistible pulse of mother¬ 
hood filling him with its strength and its courage, and 
whispering to him its everlasting message that because 
of the glory and need and faith of life had God cre¬ 
ated this land of twenty-hour day and four-hour twi¬ 
light. In it, in these days of summer, was no abiding 
place for gloom; yet in his own heart, as he drew nearer 
to his home, was a place of darkness which its light 
could not quite enter. 

The tundras had made Mary Standish more real 
to him. In the treeless spaces, in the vast reaches 
with only the sky shutting out his vision, she seemed 
to be walking nearer to him, almost with her hand in 
his. At times it was like a torture inflicted upon him 
for his folly, and when he visioned what might have 
been, and recalled too vividly that it was he who had 
stilled with death that living glory which dwelt with 
him in spirit now, a crying sob of which he was not 
ashamed came from his lips. For when he thought too 
deeply, he knew that Mary Standish would have lived 
if he had said other things to her that night aboard the 
ship. She had died, not for him, but because of him— 
because, in his failure to live up to what she believed 
she had found in him, he had broken down what must 
have been her last hope and her final faith. If he had 
been less blind, and God had given him the inspiration 
of a greater wisdom, she would have been walking with 
him now, laughing in the rose-tinted dawn, growing 
tired amid the flowers, sleeping under the clear stars— 


THE ALASKAN 


14 7 

happy and unafraid, and looking to him for all things. 
At least so he dreamed, in his immeasurable loneliness. 

He did not tolerate the thought that other forces 
might have called her even had she lived, and that she 
might not have been his to hold and to fight for. He 
did not question the possibility of shackles and chains 
that might have bound her, or other inclinations that 
might have led her. He claimed her, now that she 
was dead, and knew that living he would have pos¬ 
sessed her. Nothing could have kept him from that. 
But she was gone. And for that he was accountable, 
and the fifth night he lay sleepless under the stars, and 
like a boy he cried for her with his face upon his arm, 
and when morning came, and he went on, never had 
the world seemed so vast and empty. 

His face was gray and haggard, a face grown sud¬ 
denly old, and he traveled slowly, for the desire to reach 
his people was dying within him. He could not laugh 
with Keok and Nawadlook, or give the old tundra call 
to Amuk Toolik and his people, who would be riotous 
in their happiness at his return. They loved him. He 
knew that. Their love had been a part of his life, and 
the knowledge that his response to this love would be 
at best a poor and broken thing filled him with dread. 
A strange sickness crept through his blood; it grew in 
his head, so that when noon came, he did not trouble 
himself to eat. 

It was late in the afternoon when he saw far ahead 


148 THE ALASKAN 

of him the clump of cottonwoods near the warm 
springs, very near his home. Often he had come to 
these old cottonwoods, an oasis of timber lost in the 
great tundras, and he had built himself a little camp 
among them. He loved the place. It had seemed to 
him that now and then he must visit the forlorn trees 
to give them cheer and comradeship. His father’s 
name was carved in the bole of the greatest of them 
all, and under it the date and day when the elder Holt 
had discovered them in a land where no man had gone 
before. And under his father’s name was his mother’s, 
and under that, his own. He had made of the place a 
sort of shrine, a green and sweet-flowered tabernacle 
of memories, and its bird-song and peace in summer 
and the weird aloneness of it in winter had played 
their parts in the making of his soul. Through many 
months he had anticipated this hour of his home-com¬ 
ing, when in the distance he would see the beckoning 
welcome of the old cottonwoods, with the rolling foot¬ 
hills and frosted peaks of the Endicott Mountains be¬ 
yond. And now he was looking at the trees and the 
mountains, and something was lacking in the thrill of 
them. He came up from the west, between two willow 
ridges through which ran the little creek from the warm 
springs, and he was within a quarter of a mile of them 
when something stopped him in his tracks. 

At first he thought the sound was the popping of 
guns, but in a moment he knew it could not be so, 
and the truth flashed suddenly upon him. This day 


THE ALASKAN 


149 

was the Fourth of July, and someone in the cotton¬ 
woods was shooting firecrackers! 

A smile softened his lips. He recalled Keok’s mis¬ 
chievous habit of lighting a whole bunch at one time, 
for which apparent wastefulness Nawadlook never 
failed to scold her. They had prepared for his home¬ 
coming with a celebration, and Tautuk and Amuk 
Toolik had probably imported a supply of “bing- 
bangs” from Allakakat or Tanana. The oppressive 
weight inside him lifted, and the smile remained on 
his lips. And then as if commanded by a voice, his 
eyes turned to the dead cottonwood stub which had 
sentineled the little oasis of trees for many years. At 
the very crest of it, floating bravely in the breeze that 
came with the evening sun, was an American flag! 

He laughed softly. These were the people who 
loved him, who thought of him, who wanted him back. 
His heart beat faster, stirred by the old happiness, and 
he drew himself quickly into a strip of willows that 
grew almost up to the cottonwoods. He would sur¬ 
prise them! He would walk suddenly in among them, 
unseen and unheard. That was the sort of thing that 
would amaze and delight them. 

He came to the first of the trees and concealed him¬ 
self carefully. He heard the popping of individual 
firecrackers and the louder bang of one of the “giants” 
that always made Nawadlook put her fingers in her 
pretty ears. He crept stealthily over a knoll, down 
through a hollow, and then up again to the opposite 


150 THE ALASKAN 

crest. It was as he had thought. He could see Keok 
a hundred yards away, standing on the trunk of a fallen 
tree, and as he looked, she tossed another bunch of 
sputtering crackers away from her. The others were 
probably circled about her, out of his sight, watching 
her performance. He continued cautiously, making 
his way so that he could come up behind a thick growth 
of bush unseen, within a dozen paces of them. At 
last he was as near as that to her, and Keok was still 
standing on the log with her back toward him. 

It puzzled him that he could not see or hear the 
others. And something about Keok puzzled him, too. 
And then his heart gave a sudden throb and seemed 
to stop its beating. It was not Keok on the log. And 
it was not Nawadlook! He stood up and stepped out 
from his hiding-place. The slender figure of the girl 
on the log turned a little, and he saw the glint of 
golden sunshine in her hair. He called out. 

“Keok!” 

Was he mad? Had the sickness in his head turned 
his brain ? 

And then: 

“Mary!” he called. “Mary Stmdish!” 

She turned. And in that moment Alan Holt's face 
was the color of gray rock. It was the dead he had 
been thinking of, and it was the dead that had risen 
before him now. For It was Mary Standish who stood 
there on the old cottonwood log, shooting firecrackers 
in this evening of his home-coming. 


CHAPTER XIII 


A FTER that one calling of her name Alan’s voice 
was dead, and he made no movement. He could 
not disbelieve. It was not a mental illusion or a tem¬ 
porary upsetting of his sanity. It was truth. The shock 
of it was rending every nerve in his body, even as he 
stood as if carved out of wood. And then a strange 
relaxation swept over him. Some force seemed to pass 
out of his flesh, and his arms hung limp. She was 
there, alive! He could see the whiteness leave her face 
and a flush of color come into it, and he heard a little 
cry as she jumped down from the log and came toward 
him. It had all happened in a few seconds, but it 
seemed a long time to Alan. 

He saw nothing about her or beyond her. It was 
as if she were floating up to him out of the cold mists of 
the sea. And she stopped only a step away from him, 
when she saw more clearly what was in his face. It 
must have been something that startled her. Vaguely 
he realized this and made an effort to recover himself. 

“You almost frightened me,” she said. “We have 
been expecting you and watching for you, and I was 
out there a few minutes ago looking back over the 
tundra. The sun was in my eyes, and I didn’t see you.” 


152 THE ALASKAN 

It seemed incredible that he should be hearing her 
voice, the same voice, unexcited, sweet, and thrilling, 
speaking as if she had seen him yesterday and with a 
certain reserved gladness was welcoming him again 
today. It was impossible for him to realize in these 
moments the immeasurable distance that lay between 
their viewpoints. He was simply Alan Holt she was 
the dead risen to life. Many times in his grief he had 
visualized what he would do if some miracle could 
bring her back to him like this; he had thought of tak¬ 
ing her in his arms and never letting her go. But now 
that the miracle had come to pass, and she was within 
his reach, he stood without moving, trying only to 
speak. 

“You—Mary Standish!” he said at last. “I 
thought—” 

He did not finish. It was not himself speaking. It 
was another individual within him, a detached individ¬ 
ual trying to explain his lack of physical expression. 
He wanted to cry out his gladness, to shout with joy, 
yet the directing soul of action in him was stricken. 
She touched his arm hesitatingly. 

“I didn’t think you would care,” she said. “I thought 
you wouldn’t mind—if I came up here.” 

Care! The word was like an explosion setting 
things loose in his brain, and the touch of her hand sent 
a sweep of fire through him. He heard himself cry 
out, a strange, unhuman sort of cry, as he swept her to 
his breast. He held her close, crushing kisses upon her 


THE ALASKAN 


153 

mouth, his fingers buried in her hair, her slender body 
almost broken in his arms. She was alive—she had 
come back to him—and he forgot everything in these 
blind moments but that great truth which was sweep¬ 
ing over him in a glorious inundation. Then, suddenly, 
he found that she was fighting him, struggling to free 
herself and putting her hands against his face in her 
efforts. She was so close that he seemed to see nothing 
but her eyes, and in them he did not see what he had 
dreamed of finding—but horror. It was a stab that 
went into his heart, and his arms relaxed. She stag¬ 
gered back, trembling and swaying a little as she 
got her breath, her face very white. 

He had hurt her. The hurt was in her eyes, in the 
way she looked at him, as if he had become a menace 
from which she would run if he had not taken the 
strength from her. As she stood there, her parted lips 
showing the red of his kisses, her shining hair almost 
undone, he held out his hands mutely. 

“You think—I came here for that?” she panted. 

“No/’ he said. “Forgive me. I am sorry.” 

It was not anger that he saw in her face. It was, 
instead, a mingling of shock and physical hurt; a 
measurement of him now, as she looked at him, which 
recalled her to him as she had stood that night with her 
back against his cabin door. Yet he was not trying to 
piece things together. Even subconsciously that was 
impossible, for all life in him was centered in the one 
stupendous thought that she was not dead, but living, 


THE ALASKAN 


154 

and he did not wonder why. There was no question in 
his mind as to the manner in which she had been saved 
from the sea. He felt a weakness in his limbs; he 
wanted to laugh, to cry out, to give himself up to 
strange inclinations for a moment or two, like a 
woman. Such was the shock of his happiness. It crept 
in a living fluid through his flesh. She saw it in the 
swift change of the rock-like color in his face, and his 
quicker breathing, and was a little amazed, but Alan 
was too completely possessed by the one great thing 
to discover the astonishment growing in her eyes. 

“You are alive,” he said, giving voice again to the 
one thought pounding in his brain. “Alive!” 

It seemed to him that word wanted to utter itself an 
impossible number of times. Then the truth that was 
partly dawning came entirely to the girl. 

“Mr. Holt, you did not receive my letter at Nome?” 
she asked. 

“Your letter? At Nome?” He repeated the words, 
shaking his head. “No.” 

“And all this time—you have been thinking—I was 
dead?” 

He nodded, because the thickness in his throat made 
it the easier form of speech. 

“I wrote you there,” she said. “I wrote the letter be¬ 
fore I jumped into the sea. It went to Nome with Cap¬ 
tain Rifle’s ship.” 

“I didn’t get it.” 


THE ALASKAN I55 

“You didn’t get it ?” There was wonderment in her 
voice, and then, if he had observed it, understanding. 

“Then you didn’t mean that just now? You didn’t 
intend to do it? It was because you had blamed your¬ 
self for my death, and it was a great relief to find me 
alive. That was it, wasn’t it?” 

Stupidly he nodded again. “Yes, it was a great re¬ 
lief.” 

“You see, I had faith in you even when you wouldn’t 
help me,” she went on. “So much faith that I trusted 
you with my secret in the letter I wrote. To all the 
world but you I am dead—to Rossland, Captain Rifle, 
everyone. In my letter I told you I had arranged with 
the young Thlinkit Indian. He smuggled the canoe 
over the side just before I leaped in, and picked me 
up.. I am a good swimmer. Then he paddled me ashore 
while the boats were making their search.” 

In a moment she had placed a gulf between them 
again, on the other side of which she stood unattain¬ 
able. It was inconceivable that only a few moments 
ago he had crushed her in his arms. The knowledge 
that he had done this thing, and that she was looking 
at him now as if it had never happened, filled him with 
a smothering sense of humiliation. She made it im¬ 
possible for him to speak about it, even to apologize 
more fully. 

Now I am here,” she was saying in a quiet, posses¬ 
sive sort of way. “I didn’t think of coming when I 
jumped into the sea. I made up my mind afterward. 



156 THE ALASKAN 

I think it was because I met a little man with red 
whiskers whom you once pointed out to me in the 
smoking salon on the Nome. And so—I am your guest, 
Mr. Holt.” 

There was not the slightest suspicion of apology in 
her voice as she smoothed back her hair where he had 
crumpled it. It was as if she belonged here, and had 
always belonged here, and was giving him permission 
to enter her domain. Shock was beginning to pass 
away from him, and he could feel his feet upon the 
earth once more. His spirit-visions of her as she had 
walked hand in hand with him during the past weeks, 
her soft eyes filled with love, faded away before the 
reality of Mary Standish in flesh and blood, her quiet 
mastery of things, her almost omniscient unapproach¬ 
ableness. He reached out his hands, but there was a 
different light in his eyes, and she placed her own in 
them confidently. 

“It was like a bolt of lightning,” he said, his voice 
free at last and trembling. “Day and night I have been 
thinking of you, dreaming of you, and cursing myself 
because I believed I had killed you. And now I find 
you alive. And here!” 

She was so near that the hands he clasped lay against 
his breast. But reason had returned to him, and he 
saw the folly of dreams. 

“It is difficult to believe. Out there I thought I was 
sick. Perhaps I am. But if I am not sick, and you are 
really you, I am glad. If I wake up and find I have 


THE ALASKAN 


157 

imagined it all, as I imagined so many of the other 
things—” 

He laughed, freeing her hands and looking into eyes 
shining half out of tears at him. But he did not finish. 
She drew away from him, with a lingering of her 
finger-tips on his arm, and the little heart-beat in her 
throat revealed itself clearly again as on that night in 
his cabin. 

“I have been thinking of you back there, every hour, 
every step,” he said, making a gesture toward the 
tundras over which he had come. “Then I heard the 
firecrackers and saw the flag. It is almost as if I had 
created you!” 

A quick answer was on her lips, but she stopped it. 

“And when I found you here, and you didn’t fade 
away like a ghost, I thought something was wrong 
with my head. Something must have been wrong, I 
guess, or I wouldn’t have done that. You see, it puz¬ 
zled me that a ghost should be setting off firecrackers— 
and I suppose that was the first impulse I had of mak¬ 
ing sure you were real.” 

A voice came from the edge of the cottonwoods be¬ 
yond them. It was a clear, wild voice with a sweet 
trill in it. “Maa-rie!” it called. “Maa-rie!” 

“Supper,” nodded the girl. “You are just in time. 
And then we are going home in the twilight.” 

It made his heart thump, that casual way in which 
she spoke of his place as home. She went ahead of 
him, with the sun glinting in the soft coils of her hair, 


158 THE ALASKAN 

and he picked up his rifle and followed, eyes and soul 
filled only with the beauty of her slim figure—a glory 
of life where for a long time he had fashioned a spirit 
of the dead. They came into an open, soft with grass 
and strewn with flowers, and in this open a man was 
kneeling beside a fire no larger than his two hands, and 
at his side, watching him, stood a girl with two braids 
of black hair rippling down her back. It was Nawad- 
look who turned first and saw who it was with Mary 
Standish, and from his right came an odd little screech 
that only one person in the world could make, and that 
was Keok. She dropped the armful of sticks she had 
gathered for the fire and made straight for him, while 
Nawadlook, taller and less like a wild creature in the 
manner of her coming, was only a moment behind. 
And then he was shaking hands with Stampede, and 
Keok had slipped down among the flowers and was 
crying. That was like Keok. She always cried when 
he went away, and cried when he returned; and then, 
in another moment, it was Keok who was laughing 
first, and Alan noticed she no longer wore her hair in 
braids, as the quieter Nawadlook persisted in doing, 
but had it coiled about her head just as Mary Standish 
wore her own. 

These details pressed themselves upon him in a 
vague and unreal sort of way. No one, not even Mary 
Standish, could understand how his mind and nerves 
were fighting to recover themselves. His senses were 
swimming back one by one to a vital point from which 


THE ALASKAN 


159 

they had been swept by an unexpected sea, gripping 
rather incoherently at unimportant realities as they as¬ 
sembled themselves. In the edge of the tundra beyond 
the cottonwoods he noticed three saddle-deer grazing 
at the ends of ropes which were fastened to cotton- 
tufted nigger-heads. He drew off his pack as Mary 
Standi sh went to help Keok pick up the fallen sticks. 
Nawadlook was pulling a coffee-pot from the tiny fire. 
Stampede began to fill a pipe. He realized that be¬ 
cause they hacl expected him, if not today then tomor¬ 
row or the next day or a day soon after that, no one 
had experienced shock but himself, and with a mighty 
effort he reached back and dragged the old Alan Holt 
into existence again. It was like bringing an intelli¬ 
gence out of darkness into light. 

It was difficult for him—afterward—to remember 
just what happened during the next half-hour. The 
amazing thing was that Mary Standish sat opposite 
him, with the cloth on which Nawadlook had spread 
the supper things between them, and that she was the 
same clear-eyed, beautiful Mary Standish who had 
sat across the table from him in the dining-salon of the 
Nome . 

Not until later, when he stood alone with Stampede 
Smith in the edge of the cottonwoods, and the three 
girls were riding deer back over the tundra in the di¬ 
rection of the Range, did the sea of questions which 
had been gathering begin to sweep upon him. It had 
been Keok’s suggestion that she and Mary and Nawad- 


160 THE ALASKAN 

look ride on ahead, and he had noticed how quickly 
Mary Standish had caught at the idea. She had smiled 
at him as she left, and a little farther out had waved her 
hand at him, as Keok and Nawadlook both had done, 
but not another word had passed between them alone. 
And as they rode off in the warm glow of sunset Alan 
stood watching them, and would have stared without 
speech until they were out of sight, if Stampede’s 
fingers had not gripped his arm. 

“Now, go to it, Alan,” he said “I’m ready. Give 
me hell l” 


CHAPTER XIV 


TT WAS thus, with a note of something inevitable in 
his voice, that Stampede brought Alan back solidly 
to earth. There was a practical and awakening inspira¬ 
tion in the manner of the little red-whiskered man’s 
invitation. 

“I’ve been a damn fool,” he confessed. “And I’m 
waiting.” 

The word was like a key opening a door through 
which a flood of things began to rush in upon Alan. 
There were other fools, and evidently he had been one. 
His mind went back to the Nome. It seemed only 
a few hours ago—only yesterday—that the girl had 
so artfully deceived them all, and he had gone through 
hell because of that deception. The trickery had been 
simple, and exceedingly clever because of its simplicity; 
it must have taken a tremendous amount of courage, 
now that he clearly understood that at no time had 
she wanted to die. 

“I wonder,” he said, “why she did a thing like that?” 

Stampede shook his head, misunderstanding what 
was in Alan’s mind. “I couldn’t keep her back, not 
unless I tied her to a tree.” And he added, “The little 
witch even threatened to shoot me l” 

161 


162 


THE ALASKAN 

A flash of exultant humor filled his eyes. “Begin, 
Alan. I’m waiting. Go the limit. ,, 

“For what?” 

“For letting her ride over me, of course. For bring¬ 
ing her up. For not shufflin’ her in the bush. You 
can’t take it out of her hide, can you?” 

He twisted his red whiskers, waiting for an answer. 
Alan was silent. Mary Standish was leading the way 
up out of a dip in the tundra a quarter of a mile away, 
with Nawadlook and Keok close behind her. They 
trotted up a low ridge and disappeared. 

“It’s none of my business,” persisted Stampede, 
“but you didn’t seem to expect her—” 

“You’re right,” interrupted Alan, turning toward 
his pack. “I didn’t expect her. I thought she was 
dead.” 

A low whistle escaped Stampede’s lips. He opened 
his mouth to speak and closed it again. Alan observed 
him as he slipped the pack over his shoulders. Evi¬ 
dently his companion did not know Mary Standish 
was the girl who had jumped overboard from the 
Nome, and if she had kept her secret, it was not his 
business just now to explain, even though he guessed 
that Stampede’s quick wits would readily jump at 
the truth. A light was beginning to dispel the little 
man’s bewilderment as they started toward the Range. 
He had seen Mary Standish frequently aboard the 
Nome; a number of times he had observed her in Alan’s 
company, and he knew of the hours they had spent 


THE ALASKAN 


163 

together in Skagway. Therefore, if Alan had believed 
her dead when they went ashore at Cordova, a few 
hours after the supposed tragedy, it must have been 
she who jumped into the sea. He shrugged his 
shoulders in deprecation of his failure to discover this 
amazing fact in his association with Mary Standish. 

“It beats the devil!” he exclaimed suddenly. 

“It does,” agreed Alan. 

Cold, hard reason began to shoulder itself inevitably 
against the happiness that possessed him, and questions 
which he had found no interest in asking when aboard 
ship leaped upon him with compelling force. Why was 
it so tragically important to Mary Standish that the 
world should believe her dead ? What was it that had 
driven her to appeal to him and afterward to jump 
into the sea? What was her mysterious association 
with Rossland, an agent of Alaska’s deadliest enemy, 
John Graham—the one man upon whom he had sworn 
vengeance if opportunity ever came his way? Over 
him, clubbing other emotions with its insistence, rode 
a demand for explanations which it was impossible 
for him to make. Stampede saw the tense lines in his 
face and remained silent in the lengthening twilight, 
while Alan’s mind struggled to bring coherence and 
reason out of a tidal wave of mystery and doubt. Why 
had she come to his cabin aboard the Nomef Why 
had she played him with such conspicuous intent against 
Rossland, and why—in the end—had she preceded 
him to his home in the tundras ? It was this question 


164 THE ALASKAN 

which persisted, never for an instant swept aside by 
the others. She had not come because of love for him. 
In a brutal sort of way he had proved that, for when 
he had taken her in his arms, he had seen distress and 
fear and a flash of horror in her face. Another and 
more mysterious force had driven her. 

The joy in him was a living flame even as this 
realization pressed upon him. He was like a man who 
had found life after a period of something that was 
worse than death, and with his happiness he felt him¬ 
self twisted upon an upheaval of conflicting sensations 
and half convictions out of which, in spite of his effort 
to hold it back, suspicion began to creep like a shadow. 
But it was not the sort of suspicion to cool the thrill in 
his blood or frighten him, for he was quite ready to 
concede that Mary Standish was a fugitive, and that 
her flight from Seattle had been in the face of a des¬ 
perate necessity. What had happened aboard ship 
was further proof, and her presence at his range a 
final one. Forces had driven her which it had been 
impossible for her to combat, and in desperation she 
had come to him for refuge. She had chosen him out 
of all the world to help her; she believed in him; she 
had faith that with him no harm could come, and his 
muscles tightened with sudden desire to fight for her. 

In these moments he became conscious of the evening 
song of the tundras and the soft splendor of the miles 
reaching out ahead of them. He strained his eyes to 
catch another glimpse of the mounted figures when 


THE ALASKAN 


165 

they came up out of hollows to the clough-tops, but the 
lacy veils of evening were drawing closer, and he looked 
in vain. Bird-song grew softer; sleepy cries rose from 
the grasses and pools; the fire of the sun itself died out, 
leaving its radiance in a mingling of vivid rose and 
mellow gold over the edge of the world. It was night 
and yet day, and Alan wondered what thoughts were 
in the heart of Mary Standish. What had driven her 
to the Range was of small importance compared with 
the thrilling fact that she was just ahead of him. The 
mystery of her would be explained tomorrow. He 
was sure of that. She would confide in him. Now that 
she had so utterly placed herself under his protection, 
she would tell him what she had not dared to disclose 
aboard the Nome. So he thought only of the silvery 
distance of twilight that separated them, and spoke at 
last to Stampede. 

“I’m rather glad you brought her,” he said. 

“I didn’t bring her,” protested Stampede. “She 
came ” He shrugged his shoulders with a grunt. 
“And furthermore I didn’t manage it. She did that 
herself. She didn’t come with me. I came with her” 

He stopped and struck a match to light his pipe. 
Over the tiny flame he glared fiercely at Alan, but in 
his eyes was something that betrayed him. Alan saw 
it and felt a desire to laugh out of sheer happiness. 
His keen vision and sense of humor were returning. 

“How did it happen?” 


166 


THE ALASKAN 


Stampede puffed loudly at his pipe, then took it 
from his mouth and drew in a deep breath. 

“First I remember was the fourth night after we 
landed at Cordova. Couldn’t get a train on the new 
line until then. Somewhere up near Chitina we came 
to a washout. It didn’t rain. You couldn’t call it 
that, Alan. It was the Pacific Ocean falling on us, 
with two or three other oceans backing it up. The 
stage came along, horses swimming, coach floating, 
driver half drowned in his seat. I was that hungry 
I got in for Chitina. There was one other climbed in 
after me, and I wondered what sort of fool he was. 
I said something about being starved or I’d have hung 
to the train. The other didn’t answer. Then I began 
to swear. I did, Alan. I cursed terrible. Swore at 
the Government for building such a road, swore at 
the rain, an’ I swore at myself for not bringin’ along 
grub. I said my belly was as empty as a shot-off car¬ 
tridge, and I said it good an’ loud. I was mad. Then 
a big flash of lightning lit up the coach. Alan, it was 
her sittin’ there with a box in her lap, facing me, drip- 
pin’ wet, her eyes shining—and she was smiling at 
me! Yessir, smiling.” 

Stampede paused to let the shock sink in. He was 
not disappointed. 

Alan stared at him in amazement. “The fourth 
night—after—” He caught himself. “Go on, Stam¬ 
pede !” 

“I began hunting for the latch on the door, Alan. I 


THE ALASKAN 


167 

was goin’ to sneak out, drop in the mud, disappear 
before the lightnin’ come again. But it caught me. 
An' there she was, undoing the box, and I heard her 
saying she had plenty of good stuff to eat. An’ she 
called me Stampede, like she’d known me all her life, 
and with that coach rolling an’ rocking and the thunder 
an’ lightning an’ rain piling up against each other like 
sin, she came over and sat down beside me and began 
to feed me. She did that, Alan —fed me. When the 
lightning fired up, I could see her eyes shining and her 
lips smilin’ as if all that hell about us made her happy, 
and I thought she was plumb crazy. Before I knew 
it she was telling me how you pointed me out to her in 
the smoking-room, and how happy she was that I was 
goin’ her way. Her way, mind you, Alan, not mine. 
And that’s just the way she’s kept me goin’ up to the 
minute you hove in sight back there in the cotton¬ 
woods !” 

He lighted his pipe again. “Alan, how the devil did 
she know I was hitting the trail for your place?” 

“She didn’t,” replied Alan. 

“But she did. She said that meeting with me in the 
coach was the happiest moment of her life, because she 
was on her way up to your range, and I’d be such 
jolly good company for her. ‘Jolly good’—them were 
the words she used 1 When I asked her if you knew she 
was coming up, she said no, of course not, and that it 
was going to be a grand surprise. Said it was possible 
she’d buy your range, and she wanted to look it over 


168 


THE ALASKAN 


before you arrived. An’ it seems queer I can't re¬ 
member anything more about the thunder and light¬ 
ning between there and Chitina. When we took the 
train again, she began askin’ a million questions about 
you and the Range and Alaska. Soak me if you want 
to, Alan—but everything I knew she got out of me 
between Chitina and Fairbanks, and she got it in such 
a sure-fire nice way that I’d have eat soap out of her 
hand if she’d offered it to me. Then, sort of sly and 
soft-like, she began asking questions about John 
Graham—and I woke up.” 

“John Graham!” Alan repeated the name. 

“Yes, John Graham. And I had a lot to tell. After 
that I tried to get away from her. But she caught me 
just as I was sneakin’ aboard a down-river boat, and 
cool as you please—with her hand on my arm—she 
said she wasn’t quite ready to go yet, and would I 
please come and help her carry some stuff she was go¬ 
ing to buy. Alan, it ain’t a lie what I’m going to tell 
you! She led me up the street, telling me what a 
wonderful idea she had for surprisin’ you. Said she 
knew you would return to the Range by the Fourth 
of July and we sure must have some fireworks. Said 
you was such a good American you’d be disappointed 
if you didn’t have ’em. So she took me in a store an’ 
bought it out. Asked the man what he’d take for 
everything in his joint that had powder in it. Five 
hundred dollars, that was what she paid. She pulled 
a silk something out of the front of her dress with 


THE ALASKAN 


169 

a pad of hundred-dollar bills in it an inch thick. Then 
she asked me to get them firecrackers ’n’ wheels ’n’ 
skyrockets ’n’ balloons ’n’ other stuff down to the boat, 
and she asked me just as if I was a sweet little boy 
who’d be tickled to death to do it!” 

In the excitement of unburdening himself of a 
matter which he had borne in secret for many days, 
Stampede did not observe the effect of his words 
upon his companion. Incredulity shot into Alan’s 
eyes, and the humorous lines about his mouth vanished 
when he saw clearly that Stampede was not drawing 
upon his imagination. Yet what he had told him 
seemed impossible. Mary Standish had come aboard 
the Nome a fugitive. All her possessions she had 
brought with her in a small hand-bag, and these things 
she had left in her cabin when she leaped into the sea. 
How, then, could she logically have had such a sum 
of money at Fairbanks as Stampede described? Was 
it possible the Thlinkit Indian had also become her 
agent in transporting the money ashore on the night 
she played her desperate game by making the world 
believe she had died? And was this money—possibly 
the manner in which she had secured it in Seattle—the 
cause of her flight and the clever scheme she had put 
into execution a little later? 

He had been thinking crime, and his face grew 
hot at the sin of it. It was like thinking it of another 
woman, who was dead, and whose name was cut under 
his father’s in the old cottonwood tree. 


ijo THE ALASKAN 

Stampede, having gained his wind, was saying: 
“You don’t seem interested, Alan. But I’m going on, 
or I’ll bust. I’ve got to tell you what happened, and 
then if you want to lead me out and shoot me, I 
won’t say a word. I say, curse a firecracker anyway! 

“Go on,” urged Alan. “I’m interested.” 

“I got ’em on the boat,” continued Stampede 
viciously. “And she with me every minute, smiling 
in that angel way of hers, and not letting me out 
of her sight a flick of her eyelash, unless there was 
only one hole to go in an’ come out at. And then 
she said she wanted to do a little shopping, which 
meant going into every shack in town and buyin’ 
something, an’ I did the lugging. At last she bought 
a gun, and when I asked her what she was goin’ 
to do with it, she said, ‘Stampede, that’s for you,’ 
an’ when I went to thank her, she said: ‘No, I 
don’t mean it that way. I mean that if you try to 
run away from me again I’m going to fill you full of 
holes.’ She said that! Threatened me. Then she 
bought me a new outfit from toe to summit—boots, 
pants, shirt, hat and a necktie! And I didn’t say a 
word, not a word. She just led me in an’ bought what 
she wanted and made me put ’em on.” 

Stampede drew in a mighty breath, and a fourth 
time wasted a match on his pipe. “I was getting used 
to it by the time we reached Tanana,” he half groaned. 
“Then the hell of it begun. She hired six Indians to 
tote the luggage, and we set out over the trail for your 


THE ALASKAN 


171 

place. ‘You’re goin’ to have a rest, Stampede/ she 
says to me, smiling so cool and sweet like you wanted 
to eat her alive. ‘All you’ve got to do is show us the 
way and carry the bums.’ ‘Carry the what?’ I asks. 
The bums,’ she says, an’ then she explains that a bum 
is a thing filled with powder which makes a terrible 
racket when it goes off. So I took the bums, and the 
next day one of the Indians sprained a leg, and dropped 
out. He had the firecrackers, pretty near a hundred 
pounds, and we whacked up his load among us. I 
couldn’t stand up straight when we camped. We had 
crooks in our backs every inch of the way to the Range. 
And would she let us cache some of that junk? Not 
on your life she wouldn’t! And all the time while they 
was puffing an’ panting them Indians was worshipin’ 
her with their eyes. The last day, when we camped 
with the Range almost in sight, she drew ’em all up 
in a circle about her and gave ’em each a handful of 
money above their pay. ‘That’s because I love you,’ 
she says, and then she begins asking them funny ques¬ 
tions. Did they have wives and children? Were they 
ever hungry? Did they ever know about any of their 
people starving to death? And just why did they 
starve ? And, Alan, so help me thunder if them Indians 
didn’t talk! Never heard Indians tell so much. And 
in the end she asked them the funniest question of all, 
asked them if they’d heard of a man named John 
Graham. One of thgn had, and afterward I saw her 
talking a long time with him alone, and when she come 


172 THE ALASKAN 

back to me, her eyes were sort of burning up, and she 
didn’t say good night when she went into her tent. 
That’s all, Alan, except—” 

“Except what, Stampede?” said Alan, his heart 
throbbing like a drum inside him. 

Stampede took his time to answer, and Alan heard 
him chuckling and saw a flash of humor in the little 
man’s eyes. 

“Except that she’s done with everyone on the Range 
just what she did with me between Chitina and here,” 
he said. “Alan, if she wants to say the word, why, 
you ain’t boss any more, that’s all. She’s been there 
ten days, and you won’t know the place. It’s all done 
up in flags, waiting for you. She an’ Nawadlook and 
Keok are running everything but the deer. The kids 
would leave their mothers for her, and the men—” 
He chuckled again. “Why, the men even go to the 
Sunday school she’s started! I went. Nawadlook 
sings.” 

For a moment he was silent. Then he said in a sub¬ 
dued voice, “Alan, you’ve been a big fool.” 

“I know it, Stampede.” 

“She’s a—a flower, Alan. She’s worth more than 
all the gold in the world. And you could have married 
her. I know it. But it’s too late now. I’m warnin’ 
you.” 

“I don’t quite understand, Stampede. Why is it too 
late?” 

“Because she likes me,” declared Stampede a bit 


THE ALASKAN 


173 

fiercely. “I’m after her myself, Alan. You can’t butt 
in now.” 

“Great Scott!” gasped Alan. “You mean that Mary 
Standish—” 

“I’m not talking about Mary Standish,” said Stam¬ 
pede. “It’s Nawadlook. If it wasn’t for my 
whiskers—” 

His words were broken by a sudden detonation which 
came out of the pale gloom ahead of them. It was like 
the explosion of a cannon a long distance away. 

“One of them cussed bums,” he explained. “That’s 
why they hurried on ahead of us, Alan. She says this 
Fourth of July celebration is going to mean a lot for 
Alaska. Wonder what she means?” 

“I wonder,” said Alan. 


CHAPTER XV 


H ALF an hour more of the tundra and they came 
to what Alan had named Ghost Kloof, a deep 
and jagged scar in the face of the earth, running 
down from the foothills of the mountains. It was 
a sinister thing, and in the depths lay abysmal dark¬ 
ness as they descended a rocky path worn smooth 
by reindeer and caribou hoofs. At the bottom, a hun¬ 
dred feet below the twilight of the plains, Alan dropped 
on his knees beside a little spring that he groped for 
among the stones, and as he drank he could hear the 
weird whispering and gurgling of water up and down 
the kloof, choked and smothered in the moss of the 
rock walls and eternally dripping from the crevices. 
Then he saw Stampede’s face in the glow of another 
match, and the little man’s eyes were staring into the 
black chasm that reached for miles up into the 
mountains. 

“Alan, you’ve been up this gorge?” 

“It’s a favorite runway for the lynx and big brown 
bears that kill our fawns,” replied Alan. “I hunt alone, 
Stampede. The place is supposed to be haunted, you 
know. Ghost Kloof, I call it, and no Eskimo will 
enter it. The bones of dead men lie up there.” 

i74 


THE ALASKAN 


175 


“Never prospected it ?” persisted Stampede. 

“Never.” 

Alan heard the other’s grunt of disgust. 

“You’re reindeer-crazy,” he grumbled. “There’s 
gold in this cafion. Twice I’ve found it where there 
were dead men’s bones. They bring me good luck.” 

“But these were Eskimos. They didn’t come for 
gold.” 

“I know it. The Boss settled that for me. When 
she heard what was the matter with this place, she 
made me take her into it. Nerve? Say, I’m telling 
you there wasn’t any of it left out of her when she 
was bom!” He was silent for a moment, and then 
added: “When we came to that dripping, slimy rock 
with the big yellow skull layin’ there like a poison toad¬ 
stool, she didn't screech and pull back, but just gave 
a little gasp and stared at it hard, and her fingers 
pinched my arm until it hurt. It was a devilish- 
looking thing, yellow as a sick orange and soppy with 
the drip of the wet moss over it. I wanted to blow 
it to pieces, and I guess I would if she hadn’t put a 
hand on my gun. An’ with a funny little smile she 
says: ‘Don’t do it, Stampede. It makes me think of 
someone I know—and I wouldn’t want you to shoot 
him.’ Darned funny thing to say, wasn’t it? Made 
her think of someone she knew! Now, who the devil 
could look like a rotten skull ?” 

Alan made no effort to reply, except to shrug his 
shoulders. They climbed up out of gloom into the 


176 THE ALASKAN 

light of the plain. Smoothness of the tundra was gone 
on this side of the crevasse. Ahead of them rolled up 
a low hill, and mountainward hills piled one upon 
another until they were lost in misty distance. From 
the crest of the ridge they looked out into a vast sweep 
of tundra which ran in among the out-guarding bil¬ 
lows and hills of the Endicott Mountains in the form 
of a wide, semicircular bay. Beyond the next swell in 
the tundra lay the range, and scarcely had they reached 
this when Stampede drew his big gun from its holster. 
Twice he blazed in the air. 

“Orders,” he said a little sheepishly. ‘Orders, 
Alan!” 

Scarcely were the words out of his mouth when a 
yell came to them from beyond the light-mists that 
hovered like floating lace over the tundra. It was 
joined by another, and still another, until there was 
such a sound that Alan knew Tautuk and Amuk Toolik 
and Topkok and Tatpan and all the others were split¬ 
ting their throats in welcome, and with it very soon 
came a series of explosions that set the earth athrill 
under their feet. 

“Bums!” growled Stampede. “She’s got Chink lan¬ 
terns hanging up all about, too. You should have seen 
her face, Alan, when she found there was sunlight all 
night up here on July Fourth!” 

From the range a pale streak went sizzling into 
the air, mounting until it seemed to pause for a moment 
to look down upon the gray world, then burst into in- 


THE ALASKAN 


1 77 

numerable little balls of puffy smoke. Stampede blazed 
away with his forty-five, and Alan felt the thrill of it 
and emptied the magazine of his gun, the detonations 
of revolver and rifle drowning the chorus of sound that 
came from the range. A second rocket answered them. 
Two columns of flame leaped up from the earth as 
huge fires gained headway, and Alan could hear the 
shrill chorus of children’s voices mingling with the 
vocal tumult of men. All the people of his range 
were there. They had come in from the timber-naked 
plateaux and high ranges where the herds were feeding, 
and from the outlying shacks of the tundras to greet 
him. Never had there been such a concentration of 
effort on the part of his people. And Mary Standish 
was behind it all! He knew he was fighting against 
odds when he tried to keep that fact from choking up 
his heart a little. 

He had not heard what Stampede was saying—that 
he and Amuk Toolik and forty kids had labored a week 
gathering dry moss and timber fuel for the big fires. 
There were three of these fires now, and the tom-toms 
were booming their hollow notes over the tundra as 
Alan quickened his steps. Over a little knoll, and he 
was looking at the buildings of the range, wildly 
excited figures running about, women and children 
flinging moss on the fires, the tom-tom beaters squatted 
in a half-circle facing the direction from which he 
would come, and fifty Chinese lanterns swinging in 
the soft night-breeze. 


178 THE ALASKAN 

He knew what they were expecting of him, for they 
were children, all of them. Even Tautuk and Amuk 
Toolik, his chief herdsmen, were children. Nawad- 
look and Keok were children. Strong and loyal and 
ready to die for him in any fight or stress, they were 
still children. He gave Stampede his rifle and has¬ 
tened on, determined to keep his eyes from questing for 
Mary Standish in these first minutes of his return. He 
sounded the tundra call, and men, women, and little 
children came running to meet him. The drumming 
of the tom-toms ceased, and the beaters leaped to their 
feet. He was inundated. There was a shrill crackling 
of voice, laughter, children’s squeals, a babel of 
delight. He gripped hands with both his own— 
hard, thick, brown hands of men; little, softer, brown 
hands of women; he lifted children up in his arms, 
slapped his palm affectionately against the men’s 
shoulders, and talked, talked, talked, calling each by 
name without a slip of memory, though there were fifty 
around him counting the children. First, last, and 
always these were his people. The old pride swept 
over him, a compelling sense of power and possession. 
They loved him, crowding in about him like a great 
family, and he shook hands twice and three times 
with the same men and women, and lifted the same 
children from the arms of delighted mothers, and 
cried out greetings and familiarities with an abandon 
which a few minutes ago knowledge of Mary Stand- 
ish’s presence would have tempered. Then, suddenly, 


THE ALASKAN 


1 79 

he saw her under the Chinese lanterns in front of his 
cabin. Sokwenna, so old that he hobbled double and 
looked like a witch, stood beside her. In a moment 
Sokwenna’s head disappeared, and there came the 
booming of a tom-tom. As quickly as the crowd had 
gathered about him, it fell away. The beaters squatted 
themselves in their semicircle again. Fireworks began 
to go off. Dancers assembled. Rockets hissed through 
the air. Roman candles popped. From the open door 
of his cabin came the sound of a phonograph. It was 
aimed directly at him, the one thing intended for his 
understanding alone. It was playing “When Johnny 
Comes Marching Home.” 

Mary Standish had not moved. He saw her laugh¬ 
ing at him, and she was alone. She was not the Mary 
Standish he had known aboard ship. Fear, the quiet 
pallor of her face, and the strain and repression 
which had seemed to be a part of her were gone. She 
was aflame with life, yet it was not with voice or 
action that she revealed herself. It was in her eyes, 
the flush of her cheeks and lips, the poise of her slim 
body as she waited for him. A thought flashed upon 
him that for a space she had forgotten herself and the 
shadow which had driven her to leap into the sea. 

“It is splendid!’’ she said when he came up to her, 
and her voice trembled a little. “I didn’t guess how 
badly they wanted you back. It must be a great happi¬ 
ness to have people think of you like that.” 

“And I thank you for your part,” he replied. 


i8o THE ALASKAN 

‘‘Stampede has told me. It was quite a bit of trouble, 
wasn’t it, with nothing more than the hope of Ameri¬ 
canizing a pagan to inspire you?” He nodded at the 
half-dozen flags over his cabin. “They’re rather 
pretty.” 

“It was no trouble. And I hope you don’t mind. 
It has been great fun.” 

He tried to look casually out upon his people as he 
answered her. It seemed to him there was only one 
thing to say, and that it was a duty to speak what was 
in his mind calmly and without emotion. 

“Yes, I do mind,” he said. “I mind so much that I 
wouldn’t trade what has happened for all the gold in 
these mountains. I’m sorry because of what happened 
back in the cottonwoods, but I wouldn’t trade that, 
either. I’m glad you’re alive. I’m glad you’re here. 
But something is missing. You know what it is. You 
must tell me about yourself. It is the only fair thing 
for you to do now.” 

She touched his arm with her hand. “Let us wait 
for tomorrow. Please—let us wait.” 

“And then—tomorrow—” 

“It is your right to question me and send me back if 
I am not welcome. But not tonight. All this is too 
fine—just you—and your people—and their happi¬ 
ness.” He bent his head to catch her words, almost 
drowned by the hissing of a sky-rocket and the popping 
of firecrackers. She nodded toward the buildings be¬ 
yond his cabin. “I am with Keok and Nawadlook. 


THE ALASKAN 


181 


They have given me a home.” And then swiftly she 
added, “I don’t think you love your people more than 
I do, Alan Holt!” 

Nawadlook was approaching, and with a lingering 
touch of her fingers on his arm she drew away from 
him. His face did not show his disappointment, nor 
did he make a movement to keep her with him. 

“Your people are expecting things of you,” she said. 
“A little later, if you ask me, I may dance with you to 
the music of the tom-toms.” 

He watched her as she went away with Nawadlook. 
She looked back at him and smiled, and there was 
something in her face which set his heart beating faster. 
She had been afraid aboard the ship, but she was not 
afraid of tomorrow. Thought of it and the questions 
he would ask did not frighten her, and a happiness 
which he had persistently held away from himself 
triumphed in a sudden, submerging flood. It was as if 
something in her eyes and voice had promised him 
that the dreams he had dreamed through weeks of 
torture and living death were coming true, and that 
possibly in her ride over the tundra that night she had 
come a little nearer to the truth of what those weeks 
had meant to him. Surely he would never quite be 
able to tell her. And what she said to him tomorrow 
would, in the end, make litjle difference. She was 
alive, and he could not let her go away from him 
again. 

He joined the tom-tom beaters and the dancers. It 


182 


THE ALASKAN 

rather amazed him to discover himself doing things 
which he had never done before. His nature was an 
aloof one, observing and sympathetic, but always more 
or less detached. At his people’s dances it was his 
habit to stand on the side-line, smiling and nodding 
encouragement, but never taking a part. His habit 
of reserve fell from him now, and he seemed possessed 
of a new sense of freedom and a new desire to give 
physical expression to something within him. Stampede 
was dancing. He was kicking his feet and howling with 
the men, while the women dancers went through the 
muscular movements of arms and bodies. A chorus 
of voices invited Alan. They had always invited him. 
And tonight he accepted, and took his place between 
Stampede and Amuk Toolik and the tom-tom beaters 
almost burst their instruments in their excitement. Not 
until he dropped out, half breathless, did he see Mary 
Standish and Keok in the outer circle. Keok was 
frankly amazed. Mary Standish’s eyes were shining, 
and she clapped her hands when she saw that he had 
observed her. He tried to laugh, and waved his hand, 
but he felt too foolish to go to her. And then the 
balloon went up, a big, six-foot balloon, and with all 
its fire made only a pale glow in the sky, and after 
another hour of hand-shaking, shoulder-clapping, and 
asking of questions about health and domestic matters, 
Alan went to his cabin. 

He looked about the one big room that was his 
living-room, and it never had seemed quite so com- 


THE ALASKAN 183 

forting as now. At first he thought it was as he 
had left it, for there was his desk where it should 
be, the big table in the middle of the room, the same 
pictures on the walls, his gun-rack filled with pol¬ 
ished weapons, his pipes, the rugs on the floor—and 
then, one at a time, he began to observe things that 
were different. In place of dark shades there were 
soft curtains at his windows, and new covers on his 
table and the home-made couch in the comer. On his 
desk were two pictures in copper-colored frames, one 
of George Washington and the other of Abraham 
Lincoln, and behind them crisscrossed against the wall 
just over the top of the desk, were four tiny American 
flags. They recalled Alan’s mind to the evening aboard 
the Nome when Mary Standish had challenged his 
assertion that he was an Alaskan and not an American. 
Only she would have thought of those two pictures and 
the little flags. There were flowers in his room, and 
she had placed them there. She must have picked fresh 
flowers each day and kept them waiting the hour of his 
coming, and she had thought of him in Tanana, where 
she had purchased the cloth for the curtains and the 
covers. He went into his bedroom and found new 
curtains at the window, a new coverlet on his bed, and 
a pair of red morocco slippers that he had never seen 
before. He took them up in his hands and laughed 
when he saw how she had misjudged the size of his 
feet. 

In the living-room he sat down and lighted his pipe, 


THE ALASKAN 


184 

observing that Keok’s phonograph, which had been 
there earlier in the evening, was gone. Outside, the 
noise of the celebration died away, and the growing 
stillness drew him to the window from which he could 
see the cabin where lived Keok and Nawadlook with 
their foster-father, the old and shriveled Sokwenna. It 
was there Mary Standi sh had said she was staying. 
For a long time Alan watched it while the final sounds 
of the night drifted away into utter silence. 

It was a knock at his door that turned him about 
at last, and in answer to his invitation Stampede came 
in. He nodded and sat down. Shiftingly his eyes 
traveled about the room. 

"Been a fine night, Alan. Everybody glad to see 
you.” 

"They seemed to be. I’m happy to be home again.” 

"Mary Standish did a lot. She fixed up this room.” 

"I guessed as much,” replied Alan. "Of course Keok 
and Nawadlook helped her.” 

"Not very much. She did it. Made the curtains. 
Put them pictures and flags there. Picked the flowers. 
Been nice an’ thoughtful, hasn’t she?” 

"And somewhat unusual,” added Alan. 

"And she is pretty.” 

"Most decidedly so.” 

There was a puzzling look in Stampede’s eyes. He 
twisted nervously in his chair and waited for words. 
Alan sat down opposite him. 

"What’s on your mind, Stampede ?” 


THE ALASKAN 185 

Hell, mostly, shot back Stampede with sudden des¬ 
peration. “I’ve come loaded down with a dirty job, 
and IVe kept it back this long because I didn’t want 
to spoil your fun tonight. I guess a man ought to keep 
to himself what he knows about a woman, but I’m 
thinking this is a little different. I hate to do it. I’d 
rather take the chance of a snake-bite. But you’d 
shoot me if you knew I was keeping it to myself.” 

“Keeping what to yourself?” 

The truth, Alan. It’s up to me to tell you what 
I know about this young woman who calls herself Mary 
Standish.” 


CHAPTER XVI 


T HE physical sign of strain in Stampede’s face, and 
the stolid effort he was making to say some¬ 
thing which it was difficult for him to put into words, 
did not excite Alan as he waited for his companion’s 
promised disclosure. Instead of suspense he felt rather 
a sense of anticipation and relief. What he had passed 
through recently had burned out of him a certain de¬ 
mand upon human ethics which had been almost callous 
in its insistence, and while he believed that something 
very real and very stern in the way of necessity had 
driven Mary Standish north, he was now anxious to 
be given the privilege of gripping with any force of 
circumstance that had turned against her. He wanted 
to know the truth, yet he had dreaded the moment 
when the girl herself must tell it to him, and the fact 
that Stampede had in some way discovered this truth, 
and was about to make disclosure of it, was a tre¬ 
mendous lightening of the situation. 

“Go on,” he said at last. “What do you know about 
Mary Standish?” 

Stampede leaned over the table, a gleam of distress 
in his eyes. “It’s rotten. I know it. A man who back¬ 
slides on a woman the way I’m goin’ to oughta be shot, 


THE ALASKAN 187 

and if it was anything 1 else— anything —I’d keep it to 
myself. But you’ve got to know. And you can’t 
understand just how rotten it is, either; you haven’t 
ridden in a coach with her during a storm that was 
blowing the Pacific outa bed, an’ you haven’t hit the 
trail with her all the way from Chitina to the Range 
as I did. If you’d done that, Alan, you’d feel like kill¬ 
ing a man who said anything against her.” 

“I’m not inquiring into your personal affairs,” re¬ 
minded Alan. “It’s your own business.” 

“That’s the trouble,” protested Stampede. “It’s not 
my business. It’s yours. If I’d guessed the truth be¬ 
fore we hit the Range, everything would have been dif¬ 
ferent. I’d have rid myself of her some way. But 
I didn’t find out what she was until this evening, when 
I returned Keok’s music machine to their cabin. I’ve 
been trying to make up my mind what to do ever since. 
If she was only making her get-away from the States, 
a pickpocket, a coiner, somebody’s bunco pigeon 
chased by the police—almost anything—we could for¬ 
give her. Even if she’d shot up somebody—-” He 
made a gesture of despair. “But she didn’t. She’s 
worse than that!” 

He leaned a little nearer to Alan. 

“She’s one of John Graham’s tools sent up here to 
sneak and spy on you,” he finished desperately. “I’m 
sorry—but I’ve got the proof.” 

His hand crept over the top of the table; slowly 
the closed palm opened, and when he drew it back, a 


188 


THE ALASKAN 


crumpled paper lay between them. “Found it on the 
floor when I took the phonograph back,” he explained. 
“It was twisted up hard. Don’t know why I unrolled 
it. Just chance.” 

He waited until Alan had read the few words on 
the bit of paper, watching closely the slight tensing of 
the other’s face. After a moment Alan dropped the 
paper, rose to his feet, and went to the window. There 
was no longer a light in the cabin where Mary Stand- 
ish had been accepted as a guest. Stampede, too, had 
risen from his seat. He saw the sudden and almost 
imperceptible shrug of Alan’s shoulders. 

It was Alan who spoke, after a half-mixture of 
silence. “Rather a missing link, isn’t it? Adds up a 
number of things fairly well. And I’m grateful to you, 
Stampede. Almost—you didn’t tell me.” 

“Almost,” admitted Stampede. 

“And I wouldn’t have blamed you. She’s that kind 
—the kind that makes you feel anything said against 
her is a lie. And I’m going to believe that paper is a 
lie—until tomorrow. Will you take a message to Tau- 
tuk and Amuk Toolik when you go out? I’m having 
breakfast at seven. Tell them to come to my cabin 
with their reports and records at eight. Later I’m 
going up into the foothills to look over the herds.” 

Stampede nodded. It was a good fight on Alan’s 
part, and it was just the way he had expected him 
to take the matter. It made him rather ashamed of 
the weakness and uncertainty to which he had con- 


189 


THE ALASKAN 

fessed. Of course they could do nothing with a woman; 
it wasn’t a shooting business—yet. But there was a 
debatable future, if the gist of the note on the table 
ran true to their unspoken analysis of it. Promise of 
something like that was in Alan’s eyes. 

He opened the door. ‘Til have Tautuk and Amuk 
Toolik here at eight. Good night, Alan!” 

“Good night!” 

Alan watched Stampede’s figure until it had disap¬ 
peared before he closed the door. 

Now that he was alone, he no longer made an ef¬ 
fort to restrain the anxiety which the prospector’s 
unexpected revealment had aroused in him. The other’s 
footsteps were scarcely gone when he again had the 
paper in his hand. It was clearly the lower part of 
a letter sheet of ordinary business size and had been 
carelessly torn from the larger part of the page, so 
that nothing more than the signature and half a dozen 
lines of writing in a man’s heavy script remained. 

What was left of the letter which Alan would have 
given much to have possessed, read as follows : 

—If you work carefully and guard your real iden¬ 
tity in securing facts and information, we should have 
the entire industry in our hands within a year” 

Under these words was the strong and unmistakable 
signature of John Graham. 

A score of times Alan had seen that signature, and 


190 THE ALASKAN 

the hatred he bore for its maker, and the desire for ven¬ 
geance which had entwined itself like a fibrous plant 
through all his plans for the future, had made of it an 
unforgetable writing in his brain. Now that he held 
in his hand words written by his enemy, and the man 
who had been his father’s enemy, all that he had 
kept away from Stampede’s sharp eyes blazed in a 
sudden fury in his face. He dropped the paper as if 
it had been a thing unclean, and his hands clenched 
until his knuckles snapped in the stillness of the room, 
as he slowly faced the window through which a few 
moments ago he had looked in the direction of Mary 
Standish’s cabin. 

So John Graham was keeping his promise, the deadly 
promise he had made in the one hour of his father’s 
triumph—that hour in which the elder Holt might 
have rid the earth of a serpent if his hands had not 
revolted in the last of those terrific minutes which he 
as a youth had witnessed. And Mary Standish was 
the instrument he had chosen to work his ends 1 

In these first minutes Alan could not find a doubt 
with which to fend the absoluteness of the convictions 
which were raging in his head, or still the tumult that 
was in his heart and blood. He made no pretense to 
deny the fact that John Graham must have written this 
letter to Mary Standish; inadvertently she had kept it, 
had finally attempted to destroy it, and Stampede, by 
chance, had discovered a small but convincing rem¬ 
nant of it. In a whirlwind of thought he pieced to- 


THE ALASKAN 


191 

gether things that had happened: her efforts to interest 
him from the beginning, the determination with which 
she had held to her purpose, her boldness in following 
him to the Range, and her apparent endeavor to work 
herself into his confidence—and with John Graham’s 
signature staring at him from the table these things 
seemed conclusive and irrefutable evidence. The “in¬ 
dustry” which Graham had referred to could mean only 
his own and Carl Lomen’s, the reindeer industry which 
they had built up and were fighting to perpetuate, and 
which Graham and his beef-baron friends were com¬ 
bining to handicap and destroy. And in this game of 
destruction clever Mary Standish had come to play a 
part! 

But why had she leaped into the seaf 

It was as if a new voice had made itself heard in 
Alan’s brain, a voice that rose insistently over a vast 
tumult of things, crying out against his arguments and 
demanding order and reason in place of the mad con¬ 
victions that possessed him. If Mary Standish’s mis¬ 
sion was to pave the way for his ruin, and if she was 
John Graham’s agent sent for that purpose, what rea¬ 
son could she have had for so dramatically attempting 
to give the world the impression that she had ended 
her life at sea? Surely such an act could in no way 
have been related with any plot which she might have 
had against him! In building up this structure of her 


i 9 2 THE ALASKAN 

defense he made no effort to sever her relationship with 
John Graham; that, he knew, was impossible. The 
note, her actions, and many of the things she had said 
were links inevitably associating her with his enemy, 
but these same things, now that they came pressing one 
upon another in his memory, gave to their collusion a 
new significance. 

Was it conceivable that Mary Standish, instead of 
working for John Graham, was working against him? 
Could some conflict between them have been the reason 
for her flight aboard the Nome, and was it because she 
discovered Rossland there—John Graham s most 
trusted servant—that she formed her desperate scheme 
of leaping into the sea? 

Between the two oppositions of his thought a sick¬ 
ening burden of what he knew to be true settled upon 
him. Mary Standish, even if she hated John Graham 
now, had at one time—and not very long ago—been 
an instrument of his trust; the letter he had written 
to her was positive proof of that. What it was that 
had caused a possible split between them and had in¬ 
spired her flight from Seattle, and, later, her effort 
to bury a past under the fraud of a make-believe death, 
he might never learn, and just now he had no very 
great desire to look entirely into the whole truth of 
the matter. It was enough to know that of the past, 
and of the things that happened, she had been afraid, 
and it was in the desperation of this fear, with 
Graham’s cleverest agent at her heels, that she had 


THE ALASKAN 


193 

appealed to him in his cabin, and, failing to win him 
to her assistance, had taken the matter so dramatically 
into her own hands. And within that same hour a 
nearly successful attempt had been made upon Ross- 
land’s life. Of course the facts had shown that she 
could not have been directly responsible for his injury, 
but it was a haunting thing to remember as happening 
almost simultaneously with her disappearance into the 
sea. 

He drew away from the window and, opening the 
door, went out into the night. Cool breaths of air 
gave a crinkly rattle to the swinging paper lanterns, 
and he could hear the soft whipping of the flags which 
Mary Standish had placed over his cabin. There was 
something comforting in the sound, a solace to the 
dishevelment of nerves he had suffered, a reminder of 
their day in Skagway when she had walked at his side 
with her hand resting warmly in his arm and her eyes 
and face filled with the inspiration of the mountains. 

No matter what she was, or had been, there was 
something tenaciously admirable about her, a quality 
which had risen even above her feminine loveliness. 
She had proved herself not only clever; she was in¬ 
spired by courage—a courage which he would have 
been compelled to respect even in a man like John 
Graham, and in this slim and fragile girl it appealed 
to him as a virtue to be laid up apart and aside from 
any of the motives which might be directing it. From 
the beginning it had been a bewildering part of her— 


THE ALASKAN 


194 

a clean, swift, unhesitating courage that had leaped 
bounds where his own volition and judgment would 
have hung waveringly; that one courage in all the 
world—a woman’s courage—which finds in the ef¬ 
fort of its achievement no obstacle too high and no 
abyss too wide though death waits with outreaching 
arms on the other side. And, surely, where there had 
been all this, there must also have been some deeper 
and finer impulse than one of destruction, of physical 
gain, or of mere duty in the weaving of a human 
scheme. 

The thought and the desire to believe brought words 
half aloud from Alan’s lips, as he looked up again at 
the flags beating softly above his cabin. Mary Stand- 
ish was not what Stampede’s discovery had proclaimed 
her to be; there was some mistake, a monumental stu¬ 
pidity of reasoning on their part, and tomorrow would 
reveal the littleness and the injustice of their suspicions. 
He tried to force the conviction upon himself, and 
reentering the cabin he went to bed, still telling him¬ 
self that a great lie had built itself up cut of nothing, 
and that the God of all things was good to him because 
Mary Standish was alive, and not dead. 


CHAPTER XVII 


A LAN slept soundly for several hours, but the long 
^ strain of the preceding day did not make him 
overreach the time he had set for himself, and he was 
up at six o'clock. Wegaruk had not forgotten her old 
habits, and a tub filled with cold water was waiting 
for him. He bathed, shaved himself, put on fresh 
clothes, and promptly at seven was at breakfast. The 
table at which he ordinarily sat alone was in a little 
room with double windows, through which, as he en 
joyed his meals, he could see most of the habitations 
of the range. Unlike the average Eskimo dwellings 
they were neatly built of small timber brought down 
from the mountains, and were arranged in orderly 
fashion like the cottages of a village, strung out pret¬ 
tily on a single street. A sea of flowers lay in front 
of them, and at the end of the row, built on a little 
knoll that looked down into one of the watered hollows 
of the tundra, was Sokwenna’s cabin. Because Sok- 
wenna was the “old man” of the community and there¬ 
fore the wisest—and because with him lived his foster¬ 
daughters, Keok and Nawadlook, the loveliest of Alan's 
tribal colony—Sokwenna’s cabin was next to Alan’s 
in size. And Alan, looking at it now and then as he 
195 


THE ALASKAN 


196 

ate his breakfast, saw a thin spiral of smoke rising 
from the chimney, but no other sign of life. 

The sun was already up almost to its highest point, 
a little more than half-way between the horizon and the 
zenith, performing the apparent miracle of rising in 
the north and traveling east instead of west. Alan 
knew the men-folk of the village had departed hours 
ago for the distant herds. Always, when the reindeer 
drifted into the higher and cooler feeding-grounds of 
the foothills, there was this apparent abandonment, 
and after last night’s celebration the women and chil¬ 
dren were not yet awake to the activities of the long 
day, where the rising and setting of the sun meant 
so little. 

As he rose from the table, he glanced again toward 
Sokwenna’s cabin. A solitary figure had climbed up 
out of the ravine and stood against the sun on the 
clough-top. Even at that distance, with the sun in his 
eyes, he knew it was Mary Standish. 

He turned his back stoically to the window and 
lighted his pipe. For half an hour after that he 
sorted out his papers and range-books in preparation 
for the coming of Tautuk and Amuk Toolik, and 
when they arrived, the minute hand of his watch was 
at the hour of eight. 

That the months of his absence had been prosperous 
ones he perceived by the smiling eagerness in the brown 
faces of his companions as they spread out the papers 
on which they had, in their own crude fashion, set 


THE ALASKAN 


197 

down a record of the winter’s happenings. Tautuk’s 
voice, slow and very deliberate in its unfailing effort 
to master English without a slip, had in it a subdued 
note of satisfaction and triumph, while Amuk Toolik, 
who was quick and staccato in his manner of speech, 
using sentences seldom of greater length than three or 
four words, and who picked up slang and swear-words 
like a parrot, swelled with pride as he lighted his pipe, 
and then rubbed his hands with a rasping sound that 
always sent a chill up Alan’s back. 

“A ver’ fine and prosper’ year,” said Tautuk in re¬ 
sponse to Alan’s first question as to general conditions. 
“We bean ver’ fortunate.” 

‘‘One hell-good year,” backed up Amuk Toolik with 
the quickness of a gun. “Plenty calf. Good hoof. 
Moss. Little wolf. Herds fat. This year—she 
peach!” 

After this opening of the matter in hand Alan buried 
himself in the affairs of the range, and the old thrill, 
the glow which comes through achievement, and the 
pioneer’s pride in marking a new frontier with the crea¬ 
tive forces of success rose uppermost in him, and he 
forgot the passing of time. A hundred questions he 
had to ask, and the tongues of Tautuk and Amuk 
Toolik were crowded with the things they desired to 
tell him. Their voices filled the room with a paean of 
triumph. His herds had increased by a thousand head 
during the fawning months of April and May, and 
interbreeding of the Asiatic stock with wild, wood- 


198 THE ALASKAN 

land caribou had produced a hundred calves of the 
super-animal whose flesh was bound to fill the mar¬ 
kets of the States within a few years. Never had 
the moss been thicker under, the winter snow; there 
had been no destructive fires; soft-hoof had escaped 
them; breeding records had been beaten, and dairying 
in the edge of the Arctic was no longer an experiment, 
but an established fact, for Tautuk now had seven 
deer giving a pint and a half of milk each twice a day, 
nearly as rich as the best of cream from cattle, and 
more than twenty that were delivering from a cupful 
to a pint at a milking. And to this Amuk Toolik 
added the amazing record of their running-deer, Kauk, 
the three-year-old, had drawn a sledge five miles over 
unbeaten snow in thirteen minutes and forty-seven 
seconds; Kauk and Olo, in team, had drawn the same 
sledge ten miles in twenty-six minutes and forty sec¬ 
onds, and one day he had driven the two ninety-eight 
miles in a mighty endurance test; and with Eno and 
Sutka, the first of their inter-breed with the wild wood¬ 
land caribou, and heavier beasts, he had drawn a load 
of eight hundred pounds for three consecutive days at 
the rate of forty miles a day. From Fairbanks, Ta- 
nana, and the ranges of the Seward Peninsula agents 
of the swiftly spreading industry had offered as high 
as a hundred and ten dollars a head for breeding stock 
with the blood of the woodland caribou, and of these 
native and larger caribou of the tundras and forests 


THE ALASKAN 


199 

seven young bulls and nine female calves had been cap¬ 
tured and added to their own propagative forces. 

For Alan this was triumph. He saw nothing of 
what it all meant in the way of ultimate personal for¬ 
tune. It was the earth under his feet, the vast expanse 
of unpeopled waste traduced and scorned in the blind¬ 
ness of a hundred million people, which he saw fighting 
itself on the glory and reward of the conqueror through 
such achievement as this; a land betrayed rising at last 
out of the slime of political greed and ignorance; a 
giant irresistible in its awakening, that was destined in 
his lifetime to rock the destiny of a continent. It 
was Alaska rising up slowly but inexorably out of its 
eternity of sleep, mountain-sealed forces of a great land 
that was once the cradle of the earth coming into pos¬ 
session of life and power again; and his own feeble 
efforts in that long and fighting process of planting 
the seeds which meant its ultimate ascendancy pos¬ 
sessed in themselves their own reward. 

Long after Tautuk and Amuk Toolik had gone, his 
heart was filled with the song of success. 

He was surprised at the swiftness with which time 
had gone, when he looked at his watch. It was almost 
dinner hour when he had finished with his papers and 
books and went outside. He heard Wegaruk’s voice 
coming from the dark mouth of the underground, ice¬ 
box dug into the frozen subsoil of the tundra, and 
pausing at the glimmer of his old housekeeper’s candle, 
he turned aside, descended the few steps, and entered 


200 


THE ALASKAN 

quietly into the big, square chamber eight feet under 
the surface, where the earth had remained steadfastly 
frozen for some hundreds of thousands of years. 
Wegaruk had a habit of talking when alone, but Alan 
thought it odd that she should be explaining to herself 
that the tundra-soil, in spite of its almost tropical sum¬ 
mer richness and luxuriance, never thawed deeper than 
three or four feet, below which point remained the 
icy cold placed there so long ago that “even the spirits 
did not know.” He smiled when he heard Wegaruk 
measuring time and faith in terms of “spirits,” which 
she had never quite given up for the missionaries, and 
was about to make his presence known when a voice 
interrupted him, so close at his side that the speaker, 
concealed in the shadow of the wall, could have reached 
out a hand and touched him. 

“Good morning, Mr. Holt!” 

It was Mary Standish, and he stared rather foolishly 
to make her out in the gloom. 

“Good morning,” he replied. “I was on my way 
to your place when Wegaruk’s voice brought me here. 
You see, even this ice-box seems like a friend after my 
experience in the States. Are you after a steak, 
Mammy ?” he called. 

Wegaruk’s strong, squat figure turned as she an¬ 
swered him, and the light from her candle, glowing 
brightly in a split tomato can, fell clearly upon Mary 
Standish as the old woman waddled toward them. It 
was as if a spotlight had been thrown upon the girl 


THE ALASKAN 


201 


suddenly out of a pit of darkness, and something 
about her, which was not her prettiness or the beauty 
that was in her eyes and hair, sent a sudden and unac¬ 
countable thrill through Alan. It remained with him 
when they drew back out of gloom and chill into sun¬ 
shine and warmth, leaving Wegaruk to snuff her 
tomato-can lantern and follow with the steak, and it 
did not leave him when they walked over the tundra 
together toward Sokwenna’s cabin. It was a puzzling 
thrill, stirring an emotion which it was impossible for 
him to subdue or explain; something which he knew he 
should understand but could not. And it seemed to 
him that knowledge of this mystery was in the girl’s 
face, glowing in a gentle embarrassment, as she told 
him she had been expecting him, and that Keok and 
Nawadlook had given up the cabin to them, so that he 
might question her uninterrupted. But with this soft 
flush of her uneasiness, revealing itself in her eyes 
and cheeks, he saw neither fear nor hesitation. 

In the “big room” of Sokwenna’s cabin, which was 
patterned after his own, he sat down amid the color 
and delicate fragrance of masses of flowers, and the 
girl seated herself near him and waited for him to 
speak. 

“You love flowers,” he said lamely. “I want to 
thank you for the flowers you placed in my cabin. 
And the other things.” 

“Flowers are a habit with me,” she replied, “and 
I have never seen such flowers as these. Flowers—and 


202 THE ALASKAN 

birds. I never dreamed that there were so many up 
here.” 

‘‘Nor the world,” he added, “It is ignorant of 
Alaska.” 

He was looking at her, trying to understand the in¬ 
explicable something about her. She knew what was 
in his mind, because the strangely thrilling emotion 
that possessed him could not keep its betrayal from 
his eyes. The color was fading slowly out of her 
cheeks; her lips grew a little tense, yet in her attitude 
of suspense and of waiting there was no longer a sus¬ 
picion of embarrassment, no trace of fear, and no 
sign that a moment was at hand when her confidence 
was on the ebb. In this moment Alan did not think of 
John Graham. It seemed to him that she was like a 
child again, the child who had come to him in his cabin, 
and who had stood with her back against his cabin 
door, entreating him to achieve the impossible; an 
angel, almost, with her smooth, shining hair, her clear, 
beautiful eyes, her white throat which waited with 
its little heart-throb for him to beat down the fragile 
defense which now lay in the greater power of his own 
hands. The inequality of it, and the pitilessness of 
what had been in his mind to say and do, together 
with an inundating sense of his own brute mastery, 
swept over him, and in sudden desperation he reached 
out his hands toward her and cried: 

“Mary Standish, in God’s name tell me the truth. 
Tell me why you have come up here!” 




THE ALASKAN 


2 03 

“I have come,” she said, looking at him steadily, 
“because I know that a man like you, when he loves 
a woman, will fight for her and protect her even though 
he may not possess her.” 

“But you didn’t know that—not until—the cotton¬ 
woods !” he protested. 

“Yes, I did. I knew it in Ellen McCormick’s cabin.” 

She rose slowly before him, and he, too, rose to his 
feet, staring at her like a man who had been struck, 
while intelligence—a dawning reason—an understand¬ 
ing of the strange mystery of her that morning, sent 
the still greater thrill of its shock through him. He 
gave an exclamation of amazement. 

“You were at Ellen McCormick’s! She gave you— 
that!” 

She nodded. “Yes, the dress you brought from the 
ship. Please don’t scold me, Mr. Holt. Be a little 
kind with me when you have heard what I am going 
to tell you. I was in the cabin that last day, when you 
returned from searching for me in the sea. Mr. Mc¬ 
Cormick didn’t know. But she did. I lied a little, just 
a little, so that she, being a woman, would promise not 
to tell you I was there. You see, I had lost a great 
deal of my faith, and my courage was about gone, and 
I was afraid of you.” 

“Afraid of me?” 

“Yes, afraid of everybody. I was in the room 
behind Ellen McCormick when she asked you—that 
question; and when you answered as you did, I was 


204 THE ALASKAN 

like stone. I was amazed and didn’t believe, for I was 
certain that after what had happened on the ship you 
despised me, and only through a peculiar sense of 
honor were making the search for me. Not until two 
days later, when your letters came to Ellen McCor¬ 
mick, and we read them—” 

“You opened both?” 

“Of course. One was to be read immediately, the 
other when I was found—and I had found myself. 
Maybe it wasn’t exactly fair, but you couldn’t expect 
two women to resist a temptation like that. And— 
I wanted to know” 

She did not lower her eyes or turn her head aside 
as she made the confession. Her gaze met Alan’s 
with beautiful steadiness. 

“And then I believed. I knew, because of what you 
said in that letter, that you were the one man in all 
the world who would help me and give me a fighting 
chance if I came to you. But it has taken all my 
courage—and in the end you will drive me away—” 

Again he looked upon the miracle of tears in wide- 
open, unfaltering eyes, tears which she did not brush 
away, but through which, in a moment, she smiled at 
him as no woman had ever smiled at him before. And 
with the tears there seemed to possess her a pride which 
lifted her above all confusion, a living spirit of will 
and courage and womanhood that broke away the dark 
clouds of suspicion and fear that had gathered in his 
mind. He tried to speak, and his lips were thick. 


THE ALASKAN 205 

“You have come—because you know I love you, 
and you—” 

“Because, from the beginning, it must have been a 
great faith in you that inspired me, Alan Holt.” 

“There must have been more than that,” he per¬ 
sisted. “Some other reason.” 

“Two,” she acknowledged, and now he noticed that 
with the dissolution of tears a flush of color was re¬ 
turning into her cheeks. 

“And those—” 

“One it is impossible for you to know; the other, if 
I tell you, will make you despise me. I am sure of 
that.” 

“It has to do with John Graham?” 

She bowed her head. “Yes, with John Graham.” 

For the first time long lashes hid her eyes from him, 
and for a moment it seemed that her resolution was 
gone and she stood stricken by the import of the thing 
that lay behind his question; yet her cheeks flamed red 
instead of paling, and when she looked at him again, 
her eyes burned with a lustrous fire. 

“John Graham,” she repeated. “The man you hate 
and want to kill.” 

Slowly he turned toward the door. “I am leaving 
immediately after dinner to inspect the herds up in the 
foothills,” he said. “And you —are welcome here” 

He caught the swift intake of her breath as he paused 
for an instant at the door, and saw the new light that 
leaped into her eyes. 


206 


THE ALASKAN 


“Thank you, Alan Holt,” she cried softly. “Oh, I 
thank you!” 

And then, suddenly, she stopped him with a little 
cry, as if at last something had broken away from her 
control. He faced her, and for a moment they stood 
in silence. 

‘Tm sorry—sorry I said to you what I did that night 
on the Nome,” she said. “I accused you of brutality, 
of unfairness, of—of even worse than that, and I want 
to take it all back. You are big and clean and splendid, 
for you would go away now, knowing I am poisoned 
by an association with the man who has injured you 
so terribly, and you say I am welcome! And I don’t 
want you to go. You have made me want to tell you 
who I am, and why I have come to you, and I pray 
God you will think as kindly of me as you can when 
you have heard.” 


CHAPTER XVIII 


TT SEEMED to Alan that in an instant a sudden 
change had come over the world. There was si¬ 
lence in the cabin, except for the breath which came 
like a sob to the girl’s lips as she turned to the window 
and looked out into the blaze of golden sunlight that 
filled the tundra. He heard Tautuk’s voice, calling to 
Keok away over near the reindeer corral, and he heard 
clearly Keok’s merry laughter as she answered him. 
A gray-cheeked thrush flew up to the roof of Sok- 
wenna’s cabin and began to sing. It was as if these 
things had come as a message to both of them, re¬ 
lieving a tension, and significant of the beauty and 
glory and undying hope of life. Mary Standish turned 
from the window with shining eyes. 

“Every day the thrush comes and sings on our cabin 
roof,” she said. 

“It is—possibly—because you are here,” he re¬ 
plied. 

She regarded him seriously. “I have thought of 
that You know, I have faith in a great many unbe¬ 
lievable things. I can think of nothing more beautiful 
than the spirit that lives in the heart of a bird. I 
am sure, if I were dying, I would like to have a bird 
207 


208 


THE ALASKAN 

singing near me. Hopelessness cannot be so deep that 
bird-song will not reach it.” 

He nodded, trying to answer in that way. He felt 
uncomfortable. She closed the door which he had left 
partly open, and made a little gesture for him to re¬ 
sume the chair which he had left a few moments be¬ 
fore. She seated herself first and smiled at him wist¬ 
fully, half regretfully, as she said: 

“I have been very foolish. What I am going to tell 
you now I should have told you aboard the Nome. 
But I was afraid. Now I am not afraid, but ashamed, 
terribly ashamed, to let you know the truth. And yet 
I am not sorry it happened so, because otherwise I 
would not have come up here, and all this—your world, 
your people, and you—have meant a great deal to me. 
You will understand when I have made my con¬ 
fession.” 

“No, I don’t want that,” he protested almost roughly. 
“I don’t want you to put it that way. If I can help 
you, and if you wish to tell me as a friend, that’s dif¬ 
ferent. I don’t want a confession, which would imply 
that I have no faith in you.” 

“And you have faith in me ?” 

“Yes; so much that the sun will darken and bird¬ 
song never seem the same if I lose you again, as I 
thought I had lost you from the ship.” 

“Oh, you mean that!” 

The words came from her in a strange, tense, little 
cry, and he seemed to see only her eyes as he looked at 


THE ALASKAN 


2 09 

her face, pale as the petals of the tundra daisies behind 
her. With the thrill of what he had dared to say tug¬ 
ging at his heart, he wondered why she was so white. 

“You mean that/’ her lips repeated slowly, “after all 
that has happened—even after—that part of a letter— 
which Stampede brought to you last night—” 

He was surprised. How had she discovered what 
he thought was a secret between himself and Stam¬ 
pede ? His mind leaped to a conclusion, and she saw it 
written in his face. 

“No, it wasn’t Stampede,” she said. “He didn’t 
tell me. It—just happened. And after this letter—you 
still believe in me ?” 

“I must. I should be unhappy if I did not. And I 
am—most perversely hoping for happiness. I have told 
myself that what I saw over John Graham’s signature 
was a lie.” 

“It wasn’t that—quite. But it didn’t refer to you, 
or to me. It was part of a letter written to Rossland. 
He sent me some books while I was on the ship, and 
inadvertently left a page of this letter in one of them 
as a marker. It was really quite unimportant, when 
one read the whole of it. The other half of the page 
is in the toe of the slipper which you did not return 
to Ellen McCormick. You know that is the conven¬ 
tional thing for a woman to do—to use paper for pad¬ 
ding in a soft-toed slipper,” 

He wanted to shout; he wanted to throw up his 
arms and laugh as Tautuk and Amuk Toolik and a 


210 


THE ALASKAN 


score of others had laughed to the beat of the tom-toms 
last night, not because he was amused, but out of sheer 
happiness. But Mary Standish’s voice, continuing in 
its quiet and matter-of-fact way, held him speechless, 
though she could not fail to see the effect upon him 
of this simple explanation of the presence of Graham’s 
letter. 

“I was in Nawadlook’s room when I saw Stampede 
pick up the wad of paper from the floor,” she was say¬ 
ing. “I was looking at the slipper a few minutes be¬ 
fore, regretting that you had left its mate in my cabir 
on the ship, and the paper must have dropped then. I 
saw Stampede read it, and the shock that came in his 
face. Then he placed it on the table and went out. I 
hurried to see what he had found and had scarcely 
read the few words when I heard him returning. I 
returned the paper where he had laid it, hid myself in 
Nawadlook’s room, and saw Stampede when he car¬ 
ried it to you. I don’t know why I allowed it to be 
done. I had no reason. Maybe it was just—intuition, 
and maybe it was because—just in that hour—I so 
hated myself that I wanted someone to flay me alive, 
and I thought that what Stampede had found would 
make you do it. And I deserve it! I deserve nothing 
better at your hands.” 

“But it isn’t true,” he protested. ‘The letter was to 
Rossland.” 

There was no responsive gladness in her eyes. “Bet¬ 
ter that it were true, and all that is true were falsa,” 


THE ALASKAN 


211 


she said in a quiet, hopeless voice. “I would almost 
give my life to be no more than what those words im¬ 
plied, dishonest, a spy, a criminal of a sort; almost any 
alternative would I accept in place of what I actually 
am. Do you begin to understand ?” 

“I am afraid—I can not.” Even as he persisted in 
denial, the pain which had grown like velvety dew in 
her eyes clutched at his heart, and he felt dread of 
what lay behind it. “I understand—only—that I am 
glad you are here, more glad than yesterday, or this 
morning, or an hour ago.” 

She bowed her head, so that the bright light of day 
made a radiance of rich color in her hair, and he saw 
the sudden tremble of the shining lashes that lay against 
her cheeks; and then, quickly, she caught her breath, 
and her hands grew steady in her lap. 

“Would you mind—if I asked you first—to tell me 
your story of John Graham?” she spoke softly. “I 
know it, a little, but I think it would make everything 
easier if I could hear it from you—now.” 

He stood up and looked down upon her where she 
sat, with the light playing in her hair; and then he 
moved to the window, and back, and she had not 
changed her position, but was waiting for him to 
speak. She raised her eyes, and the question her lips 
had formed was glowing in them as clearly as if she 
had voiced it again in words. A desire rose in him 
to speak to her as he had never spoken to another 
human being, and to reveal for her—and for her alone 


212 


THE ALASKAN 

—the thing that had harbored itself in his soul for 
many years. Looking up at him, waiting, partial un¬ 
derstanding softening her sweet face, a dusky glow in 
her eyes, she was so beautiful that he cried out softly 
and then laughed in a strange repressed sort of way 
as he half held out his arms toward her. 

“I think I know how my father must have loved my 
mother, 1 ” he said. c *'But I can’t make you feel it. I 
can’t hope for that. She died when I was so young 
that she remained only as a beautiful dream for me. 
But for my father she never died, and as I grew older 
she became more and more alive for me, so that in our 
journeys we would talk about her as if she were wait¬ 
ing for us back home and would welcome us when we 
returned. And never could my father remain away 
from the place where she was buried very long at a 
time. He called it home, that little cup at the foot of 
the mountain, with the waterfall singing in summer, 
and a paradise of birds and flowers keeping her com¬ 
pany, and all the great, wild world she loved about her. 
There was the cabin, too; the little cabin where I was 
born, with its back to the big mountain, and filled with 
the handiwork of my mother as she had left it when she 
died. And my father too used to laugh and sing there— 
he had a clear voice that would roll half-way up the 
mountain; and as I grew older the miracle at times 
stirred me with a strange fear, so real to my father did 
my dead mother seem when he was home. But you 
look frightened, Miss Standish! Oh, it may seem 


THE ALASKAN 


213 

weird and ghostly now, but it was true —so true that 
I have lain awake nights thinking of it and wishing 
that it had never been so!” 

“Then you have wished a great sin,” said the girl 
in a voice that seemed scarcely to whisper between her 
parted lips. “I hope someone will feel toward me— 
some day—like that.” 

“But it was this which brought the tragedy, the 
thing you have asked me to tell you about,” he said, 
unclenching his hands slowly, and then tightening them 
again until the blood ebbed from their veins. “Inter¬ 
ests were coming in; the tentacles of power and greed 
were reaching out, encroaching steadily a little nearer 
to our cup at the foot of the mountain. But my father 
did not dream of what might happen. It came in the 
spring of the year he took me on my first trip to the 
States, when I was eighteen. We were gone five 
.months, and they were five months of hell for him. Day 
and night he grieved for my mother and the little home 
under the mountain. And when at last we came 
back—” 

He turned again to the window, but he did not see 
the golden sun of the tundra or hear Tautuk calling 
from the corral. 

“When we came back,” he repeated in a cold, hard 
voice, “a construction camp of a hundred men had in¬ 
vaded my father’s little paradise. The cabin was gone; 
a channel had been cut from the waterfall, and this 
channel ran where my mother’s grave had been. They 


214 


THE ALASKAN 


had treated it with that same desecration with which 
they have destroyed ten thousand Indian graves since 
then. Her bones were scattered in the sand and mud. 
And from the moment my father saw what had hap¬ 
pened, never another sun rose in the heavens for him. 
His heart died, yet he went on living—for a time.” 

Mary Standish had bowed her face in her hands. 
He saw the tremor of her slim shoulders; and when 
he came back, and she looked up at him, it was as if he 
beheld the pallid beauty of one of the white tundra 
flowers. 

‘‘And the man who committed that crime—was John 
Graham,” she said, in the strangely passionless voice of 
one who knew what his answer would be. 

“Yes, John Graham. He was there, representing big 
interests in the States. The foreman had objected to 
what happened; many of the men had protested; a few 
of them, who knew my father, had thrown up their 
work rather than be partners to that crime. But 
Graham had the legal power; they say he laughed as if 
he thought it a great joke that a cabin and a grave 
should be considered obstacles in his way. And he 
laughed when my father and I went to see him; yes, 
laughed in that noiseless, oily, inside way of his, as 
you might think of a snake laughing. 

“We found him among the men. My God, you 
don t know how I hated him!—Big, loose, powerful, 
dangling the watch-fob that hung over his vest, and 
looking at my father in that way as he told him what 


THE ALASKAN 


215 

a fool he was to think a worthless grave should inter¬ 
fere with his work. I wanted to kill him, but my father 
put a hand on my shoulder, a quiet, steady hand, and 
said: ‘It is my duty, Alan. My duty.’ 

“And then—it happened. My father was older, 
much older than Graham, but God put such strength 
in him that day as I had never seen before, and with 
his naked hands he would have killed the brute if I 
had not unlocked them with my own. Before all his 
men Graham became a mass of helpless pulp, and from 
the ground, with the last of the breath that was in him, 
he cursed my father, and he cursed me. He said that 
all the days of his life he would follow us, until we paid 
a thousand times for what we had done. And then 
my father dragged him as he would have dragged a rat 
to the edge of a piece of bush, and there he tore his 
clothes from him until the brute was naked; and in 
that nakedness he scourged him with whips until his 
arms were weak, and John Graham was unconscious 
and like a great hulk of raw beef. When it was over, 
we went into the mountains.’’ 

During the terrible recital Mary Standish had not 
looked away from him, and now her hands were 
clenched like his own, and her eyes and face were 
aflame, as if she wanted to leap up and strike at some¬ 
thing unseen between them. 

“And after that, Alan; after that—” 

She did not know that she had spoken his name, and 
he, hearing it, scarcely understood. 


216 


THE ALASKAN 


"John Graham kept his promise,” he answered 
grimly. "The influence and money behind him haunted 
us wherever we went. My father had been successful, 
but one after another the properties in which he was 
interested were made worthless. A successful mine in 
which he was most heavily interested was allowed to 
become abandoned. A hotel which he partly owned in 
Dawson was bankrupted. One after another things 
happened, and after each happening my father would 
receive a polite note of regret from Graham, written 
as if the word actually came from a friend. But my 
father cared little for money losses now. His heart 
was drying up and his life ebbing away for the little 
cabin and the grave that were gone from the foot of the 
mountain. It went on this way for three years, and 
then, one morning, my father was found on the beach 
at Nome, dead.” 

“Dead!” 

Alan heard only the gasping breath in which the 
word came from Mary Standish, for he was facing the 
window, looking steadily away from her. 

"Yes—murdered. I know it was the work of John 
Graham. He didn’t do it personally, but it was his 
money that accomplished the end. Of course nothing 
ever came of it. I won’t tell you how his influence and 
power have dogged me; how they destroyed the first 
herd of reindeer I had, and how they filled the news¬ 
papers with laughter and lies about me when I was 
down in the States last winter in an effort to make 


THE ALASKAN 


217 

your people see a little something of the truth about 
Alaska. I am waiting. I know the day is coming 
when I shall have John Graham as my father had him 
under our mountain twenty years ago. He must be 
fifty now. But that won’t save him when the time 
comes. No one will loosen my hands as I loosened 
my father’s. And all Alaska will rejoice, for his 
power and his money have become twin monsters that 
are destroying Alaska just as he destroyed the life of 
my father. Unless he dies, and his money-power ends, 
he will make of this great land nothing more than a 
shell out of which he and his kind have taken all the 
meat. And the hour of deadliest danger is now 
upon us.” 

He looked at Mary Standish, and it was as if death 
had come to her where she sat. She seemed not to 
breathe, and her face was so white it frightened him. 
And then, slowly, she turned her eyes upon him, and 
never had he seen such living pools of torture and of 
horror. He was amazed at the quietness of her voice 
when she began to speak, and startled by the almost 
deadly coldness of it. 

“I think you can understand—now—why I leaped 
into the sea, why I wanted the world to think I was 
dead, and why I have feared to tell you the truth/* 
she said. (f I am John Graham's wife” 



CHAPTER XIX 


LAN'S first thought was of the monstrous in- 



congruity of the thing, the almost physical im¬ 
possibility of a mesalliance of the sort Mary Standish 
had revealed to him. He saw her, young and beautiful, 
with face and eyes that from the beginning had made 
him feel all that was good and sweet in life, and 
behind her he saw the shadow-hulk of John Graham, 
the pitiless iron-man, without conscience and without 
soul, coarsened by power, fiendish in his iniquities, 
and old enough to be her father! 

A slow smile twisted his lips, but he did not know 
he smiled. He pulled himself together without let¬ 
ting her see the physical part of the effort it was 
taking. And he tried to find something to say that 
would help clear her eyes of the agony that was in 
them. 

“That—is a most unreasonable thing—to be true," 
he said. 

It seemed to him his lips were making words out of 
wood, and that the words were fatuously inefficient 
compared with what he should have said, or acted, 
under the circumstances. 

She nodded. “It is. But the world doesn’t look 
at it in that way. Such things just happen." 


218 


THE ALASKAN 


2 19 

She reached for a book which lay on the table where 
the tundra daisies were heaped. It was a book writ¬ 
ten around the early phases of pioneer life in Alaska, 
taken from his own library, a volume of statistical 
worth, dryly but carefully written—and she had been 
reading it. It struck him as a symbol of the fight 
she was making, of her courage, and of her desire to 
triumph in the face of tremendous odds that must 
have beset her. He still could not associate her com¬ 
pletely with John Graham. Yet his face was cold and 
white. 

Her hand trembled a little as she opened the book 
and took from it a newspaper clipping. She did not 
speak as she unfolded it and gave it to him. 

At the top of two printed columns was the picture 
of a young and beautiful girl; in an oval, covering a 
small space over the girl’s shoulder, was a picture of 
a man of fifty or so. Both were strangers to him. 
He read their names, and then the headlines, “A 
Hundred-Million-Dollar Love” was the caption, and 
after the word love was a dollar sign. Youth and 
age, beauty and the other thing, two great fortunes 
united. He caught the idea and looked at Mary Stand- 
ish. It was impossible for him to think of her as 
Mary Graham. 

“I tore that from a paper in Cordova,” she said. 
“They have nothing to do with me. The girl lives 
in Texas, But don’t you see something in her eyes ? 
Can't you see if, even in the picture? She has on her 


220 


THE ALASKAN 


wedding things. But it seemed to me—when I saw 
her face—that in her eyes were agony and despair and 
hopelessness, and that she was bravely trying to hide 
them from the world. It’s just another proof, one of 
thousands, that such unreasonable things do happen.” 

He was beginning to feel a dull and painless sort 
of calm, the stoicism which came to possess him when¬ 
ever he was confronted by the inevitable. He sat down, 
and with his head bowed over it took one of the limp, 
little hands that lay in Mary Standish’s lap. The 
warmth had gone out of it. It was cold and lifeless. 
He caressed it gently and held it between his brown, 
muscular hands, staring at it, and yet seeing nothing 
in particular. It was only the ticking of Keok’s clock 
that broke the silence for a time. Then he released 
the hand, and it dropped in the girl's lap again. She 
had been looking steadily at the streak of gray in his 
hair. And a light came into her eyes, a light which he 
did not see, and a little tremble of her lips, and an 
almost imperceptible inclination of her head toward 
him. 

‘Tm sorry I didn’t know,” he said. “I realize now 
how you must have felt back there in the cotton¬ 
woods.” 

“No, you don’t realize —you don’t!” she protested. 

In an instant, it seemed to him, a vibrant, flaming 
life swept over her again. It was as if his words 
had touched fire to some secret thing, as if he had 
unlocked a door which grim hopelessness had closed. 


THE ALASKAN 221 

He was amazed at the swiftness with which color came 
into her cheeks. 

“You don’t understand, and I am determined that 
you shall” she went on. “I would die before I let 
you go away thinking what is now in your mind. You 
will despise me, but I would rather be hated for the 
truth than because of the horrible thing which you 
must believe if I remain silent.” She forced a wan 
smile to her lips. “You know, Belinda Mulrooneys 
were very well in their day, but they don’t fit in now, 
do they? If a woman makes a mistake and tries to 
remedy it in a fighting sort of way, as Belinda Mul- 
rooney might have done back in the days when Alaska 
was young—” 

She finished with a little gesture of despair. 

“I have committed a great folly,” she said, hesitat¬ 
ing an instant in his silence. “I see very clearly now 
the course I should have taken. You will advise me 
that it is still not too late when you have heard what 
I am going to say. Your face is like a rock. 

“It is because your tragedy is mine,” he said. 

She turned her eyes from him. The color in her 
cheeks deepened. It was a vivid, feverish glow. I 
was born rich, enormously, hatefully rich, she said 
in the low, unimpassioned voice of a confessional. I 
don’t remember father or mother. I lived always with 
my Grandfather Standish and my Uncle Peter Stand- 
ish. Until I was thirteen I had my Uncle Peter, who 
was grandfather’s brother, and lived with us. I wor- 


222 


THE ALASKAN 

shiped Uncle Peter. He was a cripple. From young 
manhood he had lived in a wheel-chair, and he was 
nearly seventy-five when he died. As a baby that 
wheel-chair, and my rides in it with him about the 
great house in which we lived, were my delights. He 
was my father and mother, everything that was good 
and sweet in life. I remember thinking, as a child, that 
if God was as good as Uncle Peter, He was a wonder¬ 
ful God. It was Uncle Peter who told me, year 
after year, the old stories and legends of the Standishes. 
And he was always happy—always happy and glad 
and seeing nothing but sunshine though he hadn’t stood 
on his feet for nearly sixty years. And my Uncle 
Peter died when I was thirteen, five days before my 
birthday came. I think he must have been to me what 
your father was to you.” 

He nodded. There was something that was not 
the hardness of rock in his face now, and John Graham 
seemed to have faded away. 

“I was left, then, alone with my Grandfather Stand- 
ish,” she went on. “He didn’t love me as my Uncle 
Peter loved me, and I don’t think I loved him. But 
I was proud of him. I thought the whole world must 
have stood in awe of him, as I did. As I grew older 
I learned the world was afraid of him—bankers, presi¬ 
dents, even the strongest men in great financial in¬ 
terests; afraid of him, and of his partners, the 
Grahams, and of Sharpleigh, who my Uncle Peter 
had told me was the cleverest lawyer in the nation, 


THE ALASKAN 22 3 

and who had grown up in the business of the two 
families. My grandfather was sixty-eight when Uncle 
Peter died, so it was John Graham who was the actual 
working force behind the combined fortunes of the 
two families. Sometimes, as I now recall it, Uncle 
Peter was like a little child. I remember how he tried 
to make me understand just how big my grand¬ 
father’s interests were by telling me that if two 
dollars were taken from every man, woman, and 
child in the United States, it would just about add 
up to what he and the Grahams possessed, and 
my Grandfather Standish’s interests were three-quar¬ 
ters of the whole. I remember how a hunted look 
would come into my Uncle Peter’s face at times when 
I asked him how all this money was used, and where 
it was. And he never answered me as I wanted to be 
answered, and I never understood. I didn’t know why 
people feared my grandfather and John Graham. I 
didn’t know of the stupendous power my grandfather’s 
money had rolled up for them. I didn’t know”—her 
voice sank to a shuddering whisper—“I didn’t know 
how they were using it in Alaska, for instance. I 
didn’t know it was feeding upon starvation and ruin 
and death. I don’t think even Uncle Peter knew 
that.” 

She looked at Alan steadily, and her gray eyes 
seemed burning up with a slow fire. 

“Why, even then, before Uncle Peter died, I had 
become one of the biggest factors in all their schemes. 


THE ALASKAN 


224 

It was impossible for me to suspect that John Graham 
was anticipating a little girl of thirteen, and I didn’t 
guess that my Grandfather Standish, so straight, so 
grandly white of beard and hair, so like a god of power 
when he stood among men, was even then planning that 
I should be given to him, so that a monumental com¬ 
bination of wealth might increase itself still more in 
that juggernaut of financial achievement for which he 
lived. And to bring about my sacrifice, to make sure 
it would not fail, they set Sharpleigh to the task, be¬ 
cause Sharpleigh was sweet and good of face, and 
gentle like Uncle Peter, so that I loved him and had 
confidence in him, without a suspicion that under his 
white hair lay a brain which matched in cunning and 
mercilessness that of John Graham himself. And he 
did his work well, Alan.” 

A second time she had spoken his name, softly and 
without embarrassment. With her nervous fingers 
tying and untying the two corners of a little handker¬ 
chief in her lap, she went on, after a moment of silence 
in which the ticking of Keok’s clock seemed tense and 
loud. 

“When I was seventeen, Grandfather Standish died. 
I wish you could understand all that followed without 
my telling you: how I clung to Sharpleigh as a father, 
how I trusted him, and how cleverly and gently he 
educated me to the thought that it was right and just, 
and my greatest duty in life, to carry out the stipula¬ 
tion of my grandfather’s will and marry John 


THE ALASKAN 


225 

Graham. Otherwise, he told me—if that union was 
not brought about before I was twenty-two—not a 
dollar of the great fortune would go to the house of 
Standish; and because he was clever enough to know 
that money alone would not urge me, he showed me a 
letter which he said my Uncle Peter had written, and 
which I was to read on my seventeenth birthday, and 
in that letter Uncle Peter urged me to live up to the 
Standish name and join in that union of the two great 
fortunes which he and Grandfather Standish had 
always planned. I didn’t dream the letter was a for¬ 
gery. And in the end they won—and I promised.” 

She sat with bowed head, crumpling the bit of cam¬ 
bric between her fingers. “Do you despise me?” she 
asked. 

“No,” he replied in a tense, unimpassioned voice. “I 
love you.” 

She tried to look at him calmly and bravely. In his 
face again lay the immobility of rock, and in his eyes 
a sullen, slumbering fire. 

“I promised,” she repeated quickly, as if regretting 
the impulse that had made her ask him the question. 
“But it was to be business, a cold, unsentimental busi¬ 
ness. I disliked John Graham. Yet I would marry 
him. In the eyes of the law I would be his wife; in 
the eyes of the world I would remain his wife—but 
never more than that. They agreed, and I in my igno¬ 
rance believed. 

“I didn’t see the trap. I didn’t see the wicked tri- 


226 THE ALASKAN 

umph in John Graham’s heart. No power could have 
made me believe then that he wanted to possess only 
me; that he was horrible enough to want me even 
without love; that he was a great monster of a spider, 
and I the fly lured into his web. And the agony of it 
was that in all the years since Uncle Peter died I had 
dreamed strange and beautiful dreams. I lived in a 
make-believe world of my own, and I read, read, read; 
and the thought grew stronger and stronger in me that 
I had lived another life somewhere, and that I be¬ 
longed back in the years when the world was clean, 
and there was love, and vast reaches of land wherein 
money and power were little guessed of, and where 
romance and the glory of manhood and womanhood 
rose above all other things. Oh, I wanted these 
things, and yet because others had molded me, and 
because of my misguided Standish sense of pride and 
honor, I was shackling myself to John Graham. 

“In the last months preceding my twenty-second 
birthday I learned more of the man than I had ever 
known before; rumors came to me; I investigated a 
little, and I began to find the hatred, and the reason 
for it, which has come to me so conclusively here in 
Alaska. I almost knew, at the last, that he was a 
monster, but the world had been told I was to marry 
him, and Sharpleigh with his fatherly hypocrisy was 
behind me, and John Graham treated me so courteously 
and so coolly that I did not suspect the terrible things 


THE ALASKAN 227 

in his heart and mind—and I went on with the bargain. 
1 married him ” 

She drew a sudden, deep breath, as if she had passed 
through the ordeal of what she had most dreaded tc? say, 
and now, meeting the changeless expression of Alan’s 
face with a fierce, little cry that leaped from her like 
a flash of gun-fire, she sprang to her feet and stood 
with her back crushed against the tundra flowers, her 
voice trembling as she continued, while he stood up and 
faced her. 

“You needn’t go on,” he interrupted in a voice so 
low and terribly hard that she felt the menacing thrill 
of it. “You needn’t. I will settle with John Graham, 
if God gives me the chance.” 

“You would have me stop now —before I have told 
you of the only shred of triumph to which I may 
lay claim!” she protested. “Oh, you may be sure that 
I realize the sickening folly and wickedness of it all, 
but I swear before my God that I didn’t realize it then, 
until it was too late. To you, Alan, clean as the 
great mountains and plains that have been a part of 
you, I know how impossible this must seem—that I 
should marry a man I at first feared, then loathed, then 
came to hate with a deadly hatred; that I should sacri¬ 
fice myself because I thought it was a duty; that I 
should be so weak, so ignorant, so like soft clay in the 
hands of those I trusted. Yet I tell you that at no time 
did I think or suspect that I was sacrificing myself; 
at no time, blind though you may call me, did I see a 


228 


THE ALASKAN 


hint of that sickening danger into which I was volun¬ 
tarily going. No, not even an hour before the wedding 
did I suspect that, for it had all been so coldly planned, 
like a great deal in finance—so carefully adjudged by 
us all as a business affair, that I felt no fear except 
that sickness of soul which comes of giving up one’s 
life. And no hint of it came until the last of the few 
words were spoken which made us man and wife, and 
then I saw in John Graham’s eyes something which I 
had never seen there before. And Sharpleigh—” 

Her hands caught at her breast. Her gray eyes 
were pools of flame. 

“I went to my room. I didn’t lock my door, because 
never had it been necessary to do that. I didn’t cry. 
No, I didn’t cry. But something strange was hap¬ 
pening to me which tears might have prevented. It 
seemed to me there were many walls to my room; I 
was faint; the windows seemed to appear and disappear, 
and in that sickness I reached my bed. Then I saw 
the door open, and John Graham came in, and closed 
the door behind him, and locked it. My room. He 
had come into my room! The unexpectedness of it— 
the horror—the insult roused me from my stupor. I 
sprang up to face him, and there he stood, within arm’s 
reach of me, a look in his face which told me at last 
the truth which I had failed to suspect—or fear. His 
arms were reaching out— 

“ ‘You are my wife,’ he said. 

“Oh, I knew, then. 'You are my wife / he repeated. 


THE ALASKAN 


229 

I wanted to scream, but I couldn’t; and then—then— 
his arms reached me; I felt them crushing around me 
like the coils of a great snake; the poison of his lips 
was at my face—and I believed that I was lost, and 
that no power could save me in this hour from the 
man who had come to my room—the man who was 
my husband. I think it was Uncle Peter who gave me 
voice, who put the right words in my brain, who made 
me laugh—yes, laugh, and almost caress him with my 
hands. The change in me amazed him, stunned him, 
and he freed me—while I told him that in these first 
few hours of wifehood I wanted to be alone, and that 
he should come to me that evening, and that I would 
be waiting for him. And I smiled at him as I said 
these things, smiled while I wanted to kill him, and he 
went, a great, gloating, triumphant beast, believing that 
the obedience of wifehood was about to give him what 
he had expected to find through dishonor—and I was 
left alone. 

“I thought of only one thing then—escape. I saw 
the truth. It swept over me, inundated me, roared in 
rny ears. All that I had ever lived with Uncle Peter 
came back to me. This was not his world; it had never 
been—and it was not mine. It was, all at once, a 
world of monsters. I wanted never to face it again, 
never to look into the eyes of those I had known. And 
even as these thoughts and desires swept upon me, I 
was filling a traveling bag in a fever of madness, and 
Uncle Peter was at my side, urging me to hurry, tell- 


230 


THE ALASKAN 

ing me I had no minutes to lose, for the man who had 
left me was clever and might guess the truth that lay 
hid behind my smiles and cajolery. 

“I stole out through the back of the house, and a 9 
I went I heard Sharpleigh’s low laughter in the library. 
It was a new kind of laughter, and with it I heard 
John Graham’s voice. I was thinking only of the sea— 
to get away on the sea. A taxi took me to my bank, 
and I drew money. I went to the wharves, intent only 
on boarding a ship, any ship, and it seemed to me that 
Uncle Peter was leading me; and we came to a great 
ship that was leaving for Alaska—and you know— 
what happened then—Alan Holt.” 

With a sob she bowed her face in her hands, but 
only an instant it was there, and when she looked at 
Alan again, there were no tears in her eyes, but a soft 
glory of pride and exultation. 

“I am clean of John Graham,” she cried. “Clean!” 

He stood twisting his hands, twisting them in a 
helpless, futile sort of way, and it was he, and not the 
girl, who felt like bowing his head that the tears might 
come unseen. For her eyes were bright and shining 
and clear as stars. 

“Do you despise me now?” 

“I love you,” he said again, and made no movement 
toward her. 

“I am glad,” she whispered, and she did not look 
at him, but at the sunlit plain which lay beyond the 
window. 


THE ALASKAN 


231 

“And Rossland was on the Nome, and saw you, and 
sent word back to Graham,” he said, fighting to keep 
himself from going nearer to her. 

She nodded. “Yes; and so I came to you, and fail¬ 
ing there, I leaped into the sea, for I wanted them to 
think I was dead.” 

“And Rossland was hurt.” 

“Yes. Strangely. I heard of it in Cordova. Men 
like Rossland frequently come to unexpected ends.” 

He went to the door which she had closed, and 
opened it, and stood looking toward the blue billows 
of the foothills with the white crests of the mountains 
behind them. She came, after a moment, and stood 
beside him. 

“I understand,” she said softly, and her hand lay 
in a gentle touch upon his arm. “You are trying to 
see some way out, and you can see only one. That 
is to go back, face the creatures I hate, regain my 
freedom in the old way. And I, too, can see no other 
way. I came on impulse; I must return with impulse 
and madness burned out of me. And I am sorry. I 
dread it. I—would rather die.” 

“And I—” he began, then caught himself and 
pointed to the distant hills and mountains. “The 
herds are there,” he said. “I am going to them. I 
may be gone a week or more. Will you promise me 
to be here when I return?” 

“Yes, if that is your desire.’ 3 

“It is.” 


232 THE ALASKAN 

She was so near that his lips might have touched 
her shining hair. 

“And when you return, I must go. That will be 
the only way.” 

“I think so.” 

“It will be hard. It may be, after all, that I am 
a coward. But to face all that—alone 

“You won’t be alone,” he said quietly, still looking 
at the far-away hills. “If you go, I am going with 
you.” 

It seemed as if she had stopped breathing for a 
moment at his side, and then, with a little, sobbing 
cry she drew away from him and stood at the half- 
opened door of Nawadlook’s room, and the glory in 
her eyes was the glory of his dreams as he had wan¬ 
dered with her hand in hand over the tundras in those 
days of grief and half-madness when he had thought 
she was dead. 

“I am glad I was in Ellen McCormick’s cabin the 
day you came,” she was saying. “And I thank God 
for giving me the madness and courage to come to 
you. I am not afraid of anything in the world now— 
because —I love you, Alan!” 

And as Nawadlook’s door closed behind her, Alan 
stumbled out into the sunlight, a great drumming in 
his heart, and a tumult in his brain that twisted the 
world about him until for a little it held neither vision 
nor space nor sound. 


CHAPTER XX 


TN THAT way, with the beautiful world swimming 
in sunshine and golden tundra haze until foothills 
and mountains were like castles in a dream, Alan Holt 
set off with Tautuk and Amuk Toolik, leaving Stam¬ 
pede and Keok and Nawadlook at the corral bars, with 
Stampede little regretting that he was left behind to 
guard the range. For a mighty resolution had taken 
root in the prospector’s heart, and he felt himself 
thrilled and a bit trembling at the nearness of the 
greatest drama that had ever entered his life. Alan, 
looking back after the first few minutes, saw that 
Keok and Nawadlook stood alone. Stampede was 
gone. 

The ridge beyond the coulee out of which Mary 
Standish had come with wild flowers soon closed like 
a door between him and Sokwenna’s cabin, and the 
straight trail to the mountains lay ahead, and over 
this Alan set the pace, with Tautuk and Amuk Toolik 
and a caravan of seven pack-deer behind him, bearing 
supplies for the herdsmen. 

Alan had scarcely spoken to the two men. He 
knew the driving force which was sending him to the 
mountains was not only an impulse, but almost an in- 
233 


234 THE ALASKAN 

spirational thing born of necessity. Each step that 
he took, with his head and heart in a swirl of intoxicat¬ 
ing madness, was an effort behind which he was putting 
a sheer weight of physical will. He wanted to go 
back. The urge was upon him to surrender utterly 
to the weakness of forgetting that Mary Standish was 
a wife. He had almost fallen a victim to his selfish¬ 
ness and passion in the moment when she stood at 
Nawadlook’s door, telling him that she loved him. 
An iron hand had drawn him out into the day, and 
it was the same iron hand that kept his face to the 
mountains now, while in his brain her voice repeated 
the words that had set his world on fire. 

He knew what had happened this morning was not 
the merely important and essential incident of most 
human lives; it had been a cataclysmic thing with 
him. Probably it would be impossible for even the 
girl ever fully to understand. And he needed to be 
alone to gather strength and mental calmness for the 
meeting of the problem ahead of him, a complica¬ 
tion so unexpected that the very foundation of that 
stoic equanimity which the mountains had bred in 
him had suffered a temporary upsetting. His happi¬ 
ness was almost an insanity. The dream wherein he 
had wandered with a spirit of the dead had come true; 
it was the old idyl in the flesh again, his father, his 
mother—and back in the cabin beyond the ridge such 
a love had cried out to him. And he was afraid to 
return. He laughed the fact aloud, happily and with 


THE ALASKAN 


235 

an unrepressed exultation as he strode ahead of the 
pack-train, and with that exultation words came to 
his lips, words intended for himself alone, telling him 
that Mary Standish belonged to him, and that until 
the end of eternity he would fight for her and keep 
her. Yet he kept on, facing the mountains, and he 
walked so swiftly that Tautuk and Amuk Toolik fell 
steadily behind with the deer, so that in time long 
dips and swells of the tundra lay between them. 

With grim persistence he kept at himself, and at 
last there swept over him in its ultimate triumph a 
compelling sense of the justice of what he had done— 
justice to Mary Standish. Even now he did not think 
of her as Mary Graham. But she was Graham’s wife. 
And if he had gone to her in that moment of glorious 
confession when she had stood at Nawadlook’s door, 
if he had violated her faith when, because of faith, 
she had laid the world at his feet, he would have 
fallen to the level of John Graham himself. Thought 
of the narrowness of his escape and of the first mad 
desire to call her back from Nawadlook’s room, to 
hold her in his arms again as he had held her in the 
cottonwoods, brought a hot fire into his face. Some¬ 
thing greater than his own fighting instinct had turned 
him to the open door of the cabin. It was Mary 
Standish—her courage, the glory of faith and love 
shining in her eyes, her measurement of him as a 
man. She had not been afraid to say what was in 
her heart, because she knew what he would do. 


236 THE ALASKAN 

Mid-afternoon found him waiting for Tautuk and 
Amuk Toolik at the edge of a slough where willows 
grew deep and green and the crested billows of sedge- 
cotton stood knee-high. The faces of the herdsmen 
were sweating. Thereafter Alan walked with them, 
until in that hour when the sun had sunk to its lowest 
plane they came to the first of the Endicott foothills. 
Here they rested until the coolness of deeper evening, 
when a golden twilight filled the land, and then re¬ 
sumed the journey toward the mountains. 

Midsummer heat and the winged pests of the lower 
lands had driven the herds steadily into the cooler alti¬ 
tudes of the higher plateaux and valleys. Here they 
had split into telescoping columns which drifted in 
slowly moving streams wherever the doors of the 
hills and mountains opened into new grazing fields, 
until Alan’s ten thousand reindeer were in three divi¬ 
sions, two of the greatest traveling westward, and one, 
of a thousand head, working north and east. The first 
and second days Alan remained with the nearest and 
southward herd. The third day he went on with 
Tautuk and two pack-deer through a break in the 
mountains and joined the herdsmen of the second 
and higher multitude of feeding animals. There began 
to possess him a curious disinclination to hurry, and 
this aversion grew in a direct ratio with the thought 
which was becoming stronger in him with each mile 
and hour of his progress. A multitude of emotions 
were buried under the conviction that Mary Standish 


THE ALASKAN 


237 

must leave the range when he returned. He had a 
grim sense of honor, and a particularly devout one 
when it had to do with women, and though he con¬ 
ceded nothing of right and justice in the relationship 
which existed between the woman he loved and John 
Graham, he knew that she must go. To remain at the 
range was the one impossible thing for her to do. 
He would take her to Tanana. He would go with her 
to the States. The matter would be settled in a rea¬ 
sonable and intelligent way, and when he came back, 
he would bring her with him. 

But beneath this undercurrent of decision fought 
the thing which his will held down, and yet never 
quite throttled completely—that something which 
urged him with an unconquerable persistence to hold 
with his own hands what a glorious fate had given 
him, and to finish with John Graham, if it ever came 
to that, in the madly desirable way he visioned for 
himself in those occasional moments when the fires 
of temptation blazed hottest. 

The fourth night he said to Tautuk: 

“If Keok should marry another man, what would 
you do?” 

It was a moment before Tautuk looked at him, and 
in the herdsman’s eyes was a wild, mute question, as 
if suddenly there had leaped into his stolid mind a 
suspicion which had never come to him before. Alan 
laid a reassuring hand upon his arm. 

“I don’t mean she’s going to, Tautuk,” he laughed. 


238 THE ALASKAN 

“She loves you. I know it. Only you are so stupid, 
and so slow, and so hopeless as a lover that she is 
punishing you while she has the right—before she 
marries you. But if she should marry someone else, 
what would you do?” 

“My brother?” asked Tautuk. 

“No.” 

“A relative ?” 

“No.” 

“A friend?” 

“No. A stranger. Someone who had injured you, 
for instance; someone Keok hated, and who had 
cheated her into marrying him.” 

“I would kill him,” said Tautuk quietly. 

It was this night the temptation was strongest upon 
Alan. Why should Mary Standish go back, he asked 
himself. She had surrendered everything to escape 
from the horror down there. She had given up for¬ 
tune and friends. She had scattered convention to 
the four winds, had gambled her life in the hazard, and 
in the end had come to him! Why should he not 
keep her? John Graham and the world believed she 
was dead. And he was master here. If—some day— 
Graham should happen to cross his path, he would 
settle the matter in Tautuk’s way. Later, while Tautuk 
slept, and the world lay about him in a soft glow, and 
the valley below was filled with misty billows of twi¬ 
light out of which came to him faintly the curious, 
crackling sound of reindeer hoofs and the grunting 


THE ALASKAN 


239 

contentment of the feeding herd, the reaction came, 
as he had known it would come in the end. 

The morning of the fifth day he set out alone for 
the eastward herd, and on the sixth overtook Tatpan 
and his herdsmen. Tatpan, like Sokwenna’s foster- 
children, Keok and Nawadlook, had a quarter-strain 
of white in him, and when Alan came up to him in 
the edge of the valley where the deer were grazing, 
he was lying on a rock, playing Yankee Doodle on a 
mouth-organ. It was Tatpan who told him that an 
hour or two before an exhausted stranger had come 
into camp, looking for him, and that the man was 
asleep now, apparently more dead than alive, but had 
given instructions to be awakened at the end of two 
hours, and not a minute later. Together they had 
a look at him. 

He was a small, ruddy-faced man with carroty 
blond hair and a peculiarly boyish appearance as he 
lay doubled up like a jack-knife, profoundly asleep. 
Tatpan looked at his big, silver watch and in a low 
voice described how the stranger had stumbled into 
camp, so tired he could scarcely put one foot ahead 
of the other; and that he had dropped down where 
he now lay when he learned Alan was with one of the 
other herds. 

“He must have come a long distance,” said Tatpan, 
“and he has traveled fast.” 

Something familiar about the man grew upon Alan. 
Yet he could not place him. He wore a gun, which 


24 o THE ALASKAN 

he had unbelted and placed within reach of his hand 
on the grass. His chin was pugnaciously prominent, 
and in sleep the mysterious stranger had crooked a 
forefinger and thumb about his revolver in a way that 
spoke of caution and experience. 

“If he is in such a hurry to see me, you might awaken 

him,” said Alan. 

He turned a little aside and knelt to drink at a tiny 
stream of water that ran down from the snowy sum¬ 
mits, and he could hear Tatpan rousing the stranger. 
By the time he had finished drinking and faced about, 
the little man with the carroty-blond hair was on his 
feet. Alan stared, and the little man grinned. His 
ruddy cheeks grew pinker. His blue eyes twinkled, 
and in what seemed to be a moment of embarrassment 
he gave his gun a sudden snap that drew an exclama¬ 
tion of amazement from Alan. Only one man in the 
world had he ever seen throw a gun into its holster 
like that. A sickly grin began to spread over his own 
countenance, and all at once Tatpan s eyes began to 
bulge. 

“Stampede!” he cried. 

Stampede rubbed a hand over his smooth, prominent 
chin and nodded apologetically. 

“It’s me,” he conceded. “I had to do it. It was give 
one or t’other up—my whiskers or her. They went 
hard, too. I flipped dice, an’ the whiskers won. I cut 
cards, an’ the whiskers won. I played Klondike ag’in’ 


THE ALASKAN 241 

’em, an’ the whiskers busted the bank. Then I got 
mad an’ shaved ’em. Do I look so bad, Alan?” 

“You look twenty years younger,” declared Alan, 
stifling his desire to laugh when he saw the other’s 
seriousness. 

Stampede was thoughtfully stroking his chin. “Then 
why the devil did they laugh!” he demanded. “Mary 
Standish didn’t laugh. She cried. Just stood an’ 
cried, an’ then sat down an’ cried, she thought I was 
that blamed funny! And Keok laughed until she was 
sick an’ had to go to bed. That little devil of a Keok 
calls me Pinkey now, and Miss Standish says it wasn’t 
because I was funny that she laughed, but that the 
change in me was so sudden she couldn’t help it. Na- 
wadlook says I’ve got a character-ful chin—” 

Alan gripped his hand, and a swift change came over 
Stampede’s face. A steely glitter shot into the blue 
of his eyes, and his chin hardened. Nature no longer 
disguised the Stampede Smith of other days, and Alan 
felt a new thrill and a new regard for the man whose 
hand he held. This, at last, was the man whose name 
had gone before him up and down the old trails; the 
man whose cool and calculating courage, whose fear¬ 
lessness of death and quickness with the gun had writ¬ 
ten pages in Alaskan history which would never be 
forgotten. Where his first impulse had been to laugh, 
he now felt the grim thrill and admiration of men 
of other days, who, when in Stampede’s presence, knew 
they were in the presence of a master. The old Siam- 


242 THE ALASKAN 

pede had come to life again. And Alan knew why. 
The grip of his hand tightened, and Stampede re- 
turned it. 

“Some day, if we’re lucky, there always comes a 
woman to make the world worth living in, Stampede, 
he said. 

“There does,” replied Stampede. 

He looked steadily at Alan. 

“And I take it you love Mary Standish,” he added, 
“and that you’d fight for her if you had to.” 

“I would,” said Alan. 

“Then it’s time you were traveling,” advised Stam¬ 
pede significantly. “I’ve been twelve hours on the 
trail without a rest. She told me to move fast, and 
I’ve moved. I mean Mary Standish. She said it was 
almost a matter of life and death that I find you in 
a hurry. I wanted to stay, but she wouldn’t let me. 
It’s you she wants. Rossland is at the range.” 

“Rossland!” 

“Yes, Rossland. And it’s my guess John Graham 
isn’t far away. I smell happenings, Alan. We’d bet¬ 
ter hurry.” 



the man wo%e m gun . . . within %each of his hanv 




CHAPTER XXI 


OTAMPEDE had started with one of the two saddle- 
^ deer left at the range, but to ride deer-back suc¬ 
cessfully and with any degree of speed and specific 
direction was an accomplishment which he had neg¬ 
lected, and within the first half-dozen miles he had 
abandoned the adventure to continue fris journey on 
foot. As Tatpan had no saddle-deer in his herd, 
and the swiftest messenger would require many hours 
in which to reach Amuk Toolik, Alan set out for his 
range within half an hour after his arrival at Tatpan’s 
camp. Stampede, declaring himself a new man after 
his brief rest and the meal which followed it, would 
not listen to Alan’s advice that he follow later, when 
he was more refreshed. 

A fierce and reminiscent gleam smoldered in the lit¬ 
tle gun-fighter’s eyes as he watched Alan during the 
first half-hour leg of their race through the foothills to 
the tundras. Alan did not observe it, or the grimness 
that had settled in the face behind him. His own mind 
was undergoing an upheaval of conjecture and wild 
questioning. That Rossland had discovered Mary 
Standish was not dead was the least astonishing factor 
in the new development. The information might easily 
243 


244 THE ALASKAN 

have reached him through Sandy McCormick or his 
wife Ellen. The astonishing thing was that he had 
in some mysterious way picked up the trail of her 
flight a thousand miles northward, and the still more 
amazing fact that he had dared to follow her and re¬ 
veal himself openly at his range. His heart pumped 
hard, for he knew Rossland must be directly under 
Graham’s orders. 

Then came the resolution to take Stampede into his 
confidence and to reveal all that had happened on the 
day of his departure for the mountains. He proceeded 
to do this without equivocation or hesitancy, for there 
now pressed upon him a grim anticipation of impend¬ 
ing events ahead of them. 

Stampede betrayed no astonishment at the other’s 
disclosures. The smoldering fire remained in his 
eyes, the immobility of his face unchanged. Only 
when Alan repeated, in his own words, Mary Stand- 
ish’s confession of love at Nawadlook’s door did the 
fighting lines soften about his comrade’s eyes and 
mouth. 

Stampede’s lips responded with an oddly quizzical 
smile. “I knew that a long time ago,” he said. “I 
guessed it that first night of storm in the coach up 
to Chitina. I knew it for certain before we left 
Tanana. She didn’t tell me, but I wasn’t blind. It 
was the note that puzzled and frightened me—the note 
she stuffed in her slipper. And Rossland told me, 
before I left, that going for you was a wild-goose 


THE ALASKAN 2 45 

chase, as he intended to take Mrs. John Graham back 
with him immediately.” 

“And you left her alone after that?” 

Stampede shrugged his shoulders as he valiantly 
kept up with Alan’s suddenly quickened pace. 

“She insisted. Said it meant life and death for 
her. And she looked it. White as paper after her 
talk with Rossland. Besides—” 

“What?” 

“Sokwenna won’t sleep until we get back. He knows. 
I told him. And he’s watching from the garret win¬ 
dow with a .303 Savage. I saw him pick off a duck 
the other day at two hundred yards.” 

They hurried on. After a little Alan said, with the 
fear which he could not name clutching at his heart, 
“Why did you say Graham might not be far away?” 

“In my bones,” replied Stampede, his face hard as 
rock again. “In my bones!” 

“Is that all?” 

“Not quite. I think Rossland told her. She was 
so white. And her hand cold as a lump of clay when 
she put it on mine. It was in her eyes, too. Be¬ 
sides, Rossland has taken possession of your cabin 
as though he owns it. I take it that means somebody 
behind him, a force, something big to reckon with. 
He asked me how many men we had. I told him, 
stretching it a little. He grinned. He couldn’t keep 
back that grin. It was as if a devil in him slipped 
out from hiding for an instant.” 


246 THE ALASKAN 

Suddenly he caught Alan’s arm and stopped him. 
His chin shot out. The sweat ran from his face. 
For a full quarter of a minute the two men stared at 
each other. 

“Alan, we’re short-sighted. I’m damned if I don’t 
think we ought to call the herdsmen in, and every man 
with a loaded gun!” 

“You think it’s that bad?” 

“Might be. If Graham’s behind Rossland and has 
men with him—” 

“We’re two and a half hours from Tatpan,” said 
Alan, in a cold, unemotional voice. “He has only 
half a dozen men with him, and it will take at least 
four to make quick work in finding Tautuk and Amuk 
Toolik. There are eighteen men with the southward 
herd, and twenty-two with the upper. I mean, count¬ 
ing the boys. Use your own judgment. All are 
armed. It may be foolish, but I’m following your 
hunch.” 

They gripped hands. 

“It’s more than a hunch, Alan,” breathed Stampede 
softly. “And for God’s sake keep off the music as 
long as you can!” 

He was gone, and as his agile, boyish figure started 
in a half-run toward the foothills, Alan set his face 
southward, so that in a quarter of an hour they were 
lost to each other in the undulating distances of the 
tundra. 

Never had Alan traveled as on the last of this sixth 


THE ALASKAN 247 

day of his absence from the range. He was com¬ 
paratively fresh, as his trail to Tatpan’s camp had 
not been an exhausting one, and his more intimate 
knowledge of the country gave him a decided ad¬ 
vantage over Stampede. He believed he could make 
the distance in ten hours, but to this he would be com¬ 
pelled to add a rest of at least three or four hours dur¬ 
ing the night. It was now eight o’clock. By nine 
or ten the next morning he would be facing Rossland, 
and at about that same hour Tatpan’s swift messengers 
would be closing in about Tautuk and Amuk Toolik. 
He knew the speed with which his herdsmen would 
sweep out of the mountains and over the tundras. Two 
years ago Amuk Toolik and a dozen of his Eskimo 
people had traveled fifty-two hours without rest or 
food, covering a hundred and nineteen miles in that 
time. His blood flushed hot with pride. He couldn’t 
do that. But his people could—and would. He could 
see them sweeping in from the telescoping segments 
of the herds as the word went among them; he could 
see them streaking out of the foothills; and then, like 
wolves scattering for freer air and leg-room, he saw 
them dotting the tundra in their race for home—and 
war, if it was war that lay ahead of them. 

Twilight began to creep in upon him, like veils of 
cool, dry mist out of the horizons. And hour after 
hour he went on, eating a strip of pemmican when he 
grew hungry, and drinking in the spring coulees when 
he came to them, where the water was cold and clear. 


248 THE ALASKAN 

Not until a telltale cramp began to bite warningly 
in his leg did he stop for the rest which he knew he 
must take. It was one o’clock. Counting his journey 
to Tatpan’s camp, he had been traveling almost steadily 
for seventeen hours. 

Not until he stretched himself out on his back in 
a grassy hollow where a little stream a foot wide 
rippled close to his ears did he realize how tired he 
had become. At first he tried not to sleep. Rest was 
all he wanted; he dared not close his eyes. But ex¬ 
haustion overcame him at last, and he slept. When 
he awoke, bird-song and the sun were taunting him. 
He sat up with a jerk, then leaped to his feet in alarm. 
His watch told the story. He had slept soundly for 
six hours, instead of resting three or four with his eyes 
open. 

After a little, as he hurried on his way, he did not 
altogether regret what had happened. He felt like 
a fighting man. He breathed deeply, ate a breakfast 
of pemmican as he walked, and proceeded to make up 
lost time. The interval between fifteen minutes of 
twelve and twelve he almost ran. That quarter of 
an hour brought him to the crest of the ridge from 
which he could look upon the buildings of the range. 
Nothing had happened that he could see. He gave 
a great gasp of relief, and in his joy he laughed. The 
strangeness of the laugh told him more than anything 
else the tension he had been under. 

Another half-hour, and he came up out of the dip 


THE ALASKAN 


249 

behind Sokwenna’s cabin and tried the door. It was 
locked. A voice answered his knock, and he called out 
his name. The bolt shot back, the door opened, and 
he stepped in. Nawadlook stood at her bedroom door, 
a gun in her hands. Keok faced him, holding grimly 
to a long knife, and between them, staring white¬ 
faced at him as he entered, was Mary Standish. She 
came forward to meet him, and he heard a whisper 
from Nawadlook, and saw Keok follow her swiftly 
through the door into the other room. 

Mary Standish held out her hands to him a little 
blindly, and the tremble in her throat and the look in 
her eyes betrayed the struggle she was making to keep 
from breaking down and crying out in gladness at his 
coming. It was that look that sent a flood of joy into 
his heart, even when he saw the torture and hopeless¬ 
ness behind it. He held her hands close, and into her 
eyes he smiled in such a way that he saw them widen, 
as if she almost disbelieved; and then she drew in a 
sudden quick breath, and her fingers clung to him. It 
was as if the hope that had deserted her came in an 
instant into her face again. He was not excited. He 
was not even perturbed, now that he saw that light 
in her eyes and knew she was safe. But his love was 
there. She saw it and felt the force of it behind the 
deadly calmness with which he was smiling at her. 
She gave a little sob, so low it was scarcely more than 
a broken breath; a little cry that came of wonder— 
understanding—and unspeakable faith in this man who 


250 


THE ALASKAN 

was smiling at her so confidently in the face of the 
tragedy that had come to destroy her. 

“Rossland is in your cabin,” she whispered. “And 
John Graham is back there—somewhere—coming this 
way. Rossland says that if I don’t go to him of my 
own free will—” 

He felt the shudder that ran through her. 

understand the rest,” he said. They stood silent 
for a moment. The gray-cheeked thrush was singing 
on the roof. Then, as if she had been a child, he 
took her face between his hands and bent her head 
back a little, so that he was looking straight into her 
eyes, and so near that he could feel the sweet warmth 
of her breath. 

•“You didn’t make a mistake the day I went away?” 
he asked. “You—love me?” 

J ‘Yes.” 

For a moment longer he looked into her eyes. Then 
he stood back from her. Even Keok and Nawadlook 
heard his laugh. It was strange, they thought—Keok 
with her knife, and Nawadlook with her gun—for the 
bird was singing, and Alan Holt was laughing, and 
Mary Standish was very still. 

Another moment later, from where he sat cross- 
legged at the little window in the attic, keeping his 
unsleeping vigil with a rifle across his knees, did 
Sokwenna saw his master walk across the open, and 
something in the manner of his going brought back 
a vision of another day long ago when Ghost Kloof 


THE ALASKAN 


251 


had rung with the cries of battle, and the hands now 
gnarled and twisted with age had played their part 
in the heroic stand of his people against the oppressors 
from the farther north. 

Then he saw Alan go into the cabin where Rossland 
was, and softly his fingers drummed upon the ancient 
tom-tom which lay at his side. His eyes fixed them¬ 
selves upon the distant mountains, and under his 
breath he mumbled the old chant of battle, dead and 
forgotten except in Sokwenna’s brain, and after that 
his eyes closed, and again the vision grew out of dark¬ 
ness like a picture for him, a vision of twisting trails 
and of fighting men gathering with their faces set for 
war. 


CHAPTER XXII 


T THE desk in Alan’s living-room sat Rossland, 



when the door opened behind him and the master 
of the range came in. He was not disturbed when he 
saw who it was, and rose to meet him. His coat was 
off, his sleeves rolled up, and it was evident he was 
making no effort to conceal his freedom with Alan’s 
books and papers. 

He advanced, holding out a hand. This was not 
the same Rossland who had told Alan to attend to his 
own business on board the Nome. His attitude was 
that of one greeting a friend, smiling and affable even 
before he spoke. Something inspired Alan to return 
the smile. Behind that smile he was admiring the 
man’s nerve. His hand met Rossland’s casually, but 
there was no uncertainty in the warmth of the other’s 


gnp. 


“How d’ do, Paris, old boy?” he greeted good- 
humoredly. “Saw you going in to Helen a few min¬ 
utes ago, so I’ve been waiting for you. She’s a little 
frightened. And we can’t blame her. Menelaus is 
mightily upset. But mind me, Holt, I’m not blaming 
you. I’m too good a sport. Clever, I call it—damned 
clever. She’s enough to turn any man’s head. I only 
wish I were in your boots right now. I’d have turned 


THE ALASKAN 253 

traitor myself aboard the Nome if she had shown an 
inclination.” 

He proffered a cigar, a big, fat cigar with a gold 
band. It was inspiration again that made Alan accept 
it and light it. His blood was racing. But Rossland 
saw nothing of that. He observed only the nod, the 
cool smile on Alan’s lips, the apparent nonchalance 
with which he was meeting the situation. It pleased 
Graham’s agent. He reseated himself in the desk- 
chair and motioned Alan to another chair near him. 

Sf l thought you were badly hurt,” said Alan. “Nasty 
knife wound you got.” 

Rossland shrugged his shoulders. “There you have 
it again, Holt—the hell of letting a pretty face run 
away with you. One of the Thlinkit girls down in 
the steerage, you know. Lovely little thing, wasn’t 
she? Tricked her into my cabin all right, but she 
wasn’t like some other Indian girls I’ve known. The 
next night a brother, or sweetheart, or whoever it was 
got me through the open port. It wasn’t bad. I was 
out of the hospital within a week. Lucky I was put 
there, too. Otherwise I wouldn’t have seen Mrs. 
Graham one morning—through the window. What 
a little our fortunes hang to at times, eh? If it hadn’t 
been for the girl and the knife and the hospital, I 
wouldn’t be here now, and Graham wouldn’t be bleed¬ 
ing his heart out with impatience—and you, Holt, 
wouldn’t be facing the biggest opportunity that will 
aver come into your life.” 


254 


THE ALASKAN 


“I’m afraid I don’t understand,” said Alan, hiding 
his face in the smoke of his cigar and speaking with 
an apparent indifference which had its effect upon 
Rossland. “Your presence inclines me to believe that 
luck has rather turned against me. Where can my 
advantage be?” 

A grim seriousness settled in Rossland’s eyes, and 
his voice became cool and hard. “Holt, as two men 
who are not afraid to meet unusual situations, we may 
as well call a spade a spade in this matter, don’t you 
think so?” 

“Decidedly,” said Alan. 

“You know that Mary Standish is really Mary 
Standish Graham, John Graham’s wife?” 

“Yes.” 

“And you probably know—now—why she jumped 
into the sea, and why she ran away from Graham.” 

“I do.” 

“That saves a lot of talk. But there is another 
side to the story which you probably don’t know, and 
I am here to tell it to you. John Graham doesn’t care 
for a dollar of the Standish fortune. It’s the girl he 
wants, and has always wanted. She has grown up 
under his eyes. From the day she was fourteen years 
old he has lived and planned with the thought of 
possessing her. You know how he got her to marry 
him, and you know what happened afterward. But 
it makes no difference to him whether she hates him 
or not. He wants her. And this”—he swept his 


THE ALASKAN 255 

arms out, “is the most beautiful place in the world in 
which to have her returned to him. I’ve been figuring 
from your books. Your property isn’t worth over a 
hundred thousand dollars as it stands on hoof today. 
I’m here to offer you five times that for it. In other 
words, Graham is willing to forfeit all action he might 
have personally against you for stealing his wife, and 
in place of that will pay you five hundred thousand 
dollars for the privilege of having his honeymoon here, 
and making of this place a country estate where his 
wife may reside indefinitely, subject to her husband’s 
visits when he is so inclined. There will be a stipula¬ 
tion, of course, requiring that the personal details 
of the deal be kept strictly confidential, and that you 
leave the country. Do I make myself clear?” 

Alan rose to his feet and paced thoughtfully across 
the room. At least, Rossland measured his action as 
one of sudden, intensive reflection as he watched him, 
smiling complacently at the effect of his knock-out 
proposition upon the other. He had not minced mat¬ 
ters. He had come to the point without an effort at 
bargaining, and he possessed sufficient dramatic sense 
to appreciate what the offer of half a million dollars 
meant to an individual who was struggling for exist¬ 
ence at the edge of a raw frontier. Alan stood with his 
back toward him, facing a window. His voice was 
oddly strained when he answered. But that was quite 
natural, too, Rossland thought. 

“I am wondering if I understand you,” he S3»d. 


THE ALASKAN 


256 

“Do you mean that if I sell Graham the range, leave 
it bag and baggage, and agree to keep my mouth shut 
thereafter, he will give me half a million dollars ?” 

“That is the price. You are to take your people 
with you. Graham has his own.” 

Alan tried to laugh. “I think I see the point—now. 
He isn’t paying five hundred thousand for Miss Stand- 
ish—I mean Mrs. Graham. He’s paying it for the 
isolation.” 

“Exactly. It was a last-minute hunch with him— 
to settle the matter peaceably. We started up here to 
get his wife. You understand, to get her, and settle 
the matter with you in a different way from the one 
we’re using now. You hit the word when you said 
‘isolation.’ What a damn fool a man can make of 
himself over a pretty face! Think of it—half a mil¬ 
lion dollars!” 

“It sounds unreal,” mused Alan, keeping his face 
to the window. “Why should he offer so much?” 

“You must keep the stipulation in mind, Holt. That 
is an important part of the deal. You are to keep 
your mouth shut. Buying the range at a normal price 
wouldn’t guarantee it. But when you accept a sum 
like that, you’re a partner in the other end of the trans¬ 
action, and your health depends upon keeping the mat¬ 
ter quiet. Simple enough, isn’t it?” 

Alan turned back to the table. His face was pale. 
He tried to keep smoke in front of his eves. “Of 
course, I don’t suppose he’d allow Mrs. Graham to 


THE ALASKAN 2^7 

escape back to the States—where she might do a little 
upsetting on her own account?” 

“He isn’t throwing the money away,” replied Ross- 
land significantly. 

“She would remain here indefinitely?” 

“Indefinitely.” 

“Probably never would return.” 

“Strange how squarely you hit the nail on the head! 
Why should she return? The world believes she is 
dead. Papers were full of it. The little secret of her 
being alive is all our own. And this will be a beautiful 
summering place for Graham. Magnificent climate. 
Lovely flowers. Birds. And the girl he has watched 
grow up, and wanted, since she was fourteen.” 

“And who hates him.” 

“True.” 

“Who was tricked into marrying him, and who 
would rather die than live with him as his wife.” 

“But it’s up to Graham to keep her alive, Holt. 
That’s not our business. If she dies, I imagine you 
will have an opportunity to get your range back pretty 
cheap.” 

Rossland held a paper out to Alan. 

“Here’s partial payment—two hundred and fifty 
thousand. I have the papers here, on the desk, ready 
to sign. As soon as you give possession, I’ll return 
to Tanana with you and make the remaining pay¬ 
ment.” 


THE ALASKAN 


258 

Alan took the check. “I guess only a fool would 
refuse an offer like this, Rossland.” 

“Yes, only a fool. ,, 

“And I am that fool” 

So quietly did Alan speak that for an instant the 
significance of his words did not fall with full force 
upon Rossland. The smoke cleared away from before 
Alan’s face. His cigar dropped to the floor, and he 
stepped on it with his foot. The check followed it in 
torn scraps. The fury he had held back with almost 
superhuman effort blazed in his eyes. 

“If I could have Graham where you are now —in 
that chair —I’d give ten years of my life, Rossland. I 
would kill him. And you— you —” 

He stepped back a pace, as if to put himself out 
of striking distance of the beast who was staring at 
him in amazement. 

“What you have said about her should condemn you 
to death. And I would kill you here, in this room, 
if it wasn’t necessary for you to take my message 
back to Graham. Tell him that Mary Standish —not 
Mary Graham—is as pure and clean and as sweet as 
the day she was born. Tell him that she belongs tc 
me. I love her. She is mine—do you understand? 
And all the money in the world couldn’t buy one hair 
from her head. I’m going to take her back to the 
States. She is going to get a square deal, and the 
world is going to know her story. She has nothing 


THE ALASKAN 259 

to conceal. Absolutely nothing. Tell that to John 
Graham for me.” 

He advanced upon Rossland, who had risen from 
his chair; his hands were clenched, his face a mask of 
iron. 

“Get out! Go before I flay you within an inch of 
your rotten life!” 

The energy which every fiber in him yearned to ex¬ 
pend upon Rossland sent the table crashing back in 
an overturned wreck against the wall. 

“Go—before I kill you!” 

He was advancing, even as the words of warning 
came from his lips, and the man before him, an awe¬ 
stricken mass of flesh that had forgotten power and 
courage in the face of a deadly and unexpected menace, 
backed quickly to the door and escaped. He made 
for the corrals, and Alan watched from his door until 
he saw him departing southward, accompanied by two 
men who bore packs on their shoulders. Not until 
then did Rossland gather his nerve sufficiently to stop 
and look back. His breathless voice carried something 
unintelligible to Alan. But he did not return for his 
coat and hat. 

The reaction came to Alan when he saw the wreck 
he had made of the table. Another moment or two 
and the devil in him would have been at work. He 
hated Rossland. He hated him now only a little less 
than he hated John Graham, and that he had let him 
go seemed a miracle to him. He felt the strain he 


26 o 


THE ALASKAN 


had been under. But he was glad. Some little god of 
common sense had overruled his passion, and he had 
acted wisely. Graham would now get his message, 
and there could be no misunderstanding of purpose 
between them. 

He was staring at the disordered papers on his 
desk when a movement at the door turned him about. 
Mary Standish stood before him. 

“You sent him away,” she cried softly. 

Her eyes were shining, her lips parted, her face lit 
up with a beautiful glow. She saw the overturned 
table, Rossland’s hat and coat on a chair, the evidence 
of what had happened and the quickness of his flight; 
and then she turned her face to Alan again, and what 
he saw broke down the last of that grim resolution 
which he had measured for himself, so that in a 
moment he was at her side, and had her in his 
arms. She made no effort to free herself as she 
had done in the cottonwoods, but turned her mouth 
up for him to kiss, and then hid her face against 
his shoulder—while he, fighting vainly to find utter¬ 
ance for the thousand words in his throat, stood 
stroking her hair, and then buried his face in it, 
crying out at last in the warm sweetness of it that 
he loved her, and was going to fight for her, and that 
no power on earth could take her away from him now. 
And these things he repeated until she raised her 
flushed face from his breast, and let him kiss her lips 
once more, and then freed herself gently from his arms. 


CHAPTER XXIII 


F OR a space they stood apart, and in the radiant 
loveliness of Mary Standish’s face and in Alan's 
quiet and unimpassioned attitude were neither shame 
nor regret. In a moment they had swept aside the 
barrier which convention had raised against them, 
and now they felt the inevitable thrill of joy and 
triumph, and not the humiliating embarrassment of 
dishonor. They made no effort to draw a curtain 
upon their happiness, or to hide the swift heart-beat 
of it from each other. It had happened, and they were 
glad. Yet they stood apart, and something pressed 
upon Alan the inviolableness of the little freedom of 
space between them, of its sacredness to Mary Standish, 
and darker and deeper grew the glory of pride and 
faith that lay with the love in her eyes when he did 
not cross it. He reached out his hand, and freely she 
gave him her own. Lips blushing with his kisses 
trembled in a smile, and she bowed her head a little, 
so that he was looking at her smooth hair, soft and 
sweet where he had caressed it a few moments before. 
‘‘I thank God!” he said. 

He did not finish the surge of gratitude that was 
in his heart. Speech seemed trivial, even futile. But 
261 


262 


THE ALASKAN 


she understood. He was not thanking God for that 
moment, but for a lifetime of something that at last 
had come to him. This, it seemed to him, was the 
end, the end of a world as he had known it, the be¬ 
ginning of a new. He stepped back, and his hands 
trembled. For something to do he set up the over¬ 
turned table, and Mary Standish watched him with 
a quiet, satisfied wonder. She loved him, and she 
had come into his arms. She had given him her 
lips to kiss. And he laughed softly as he came to 
her side again, and looked over the tundra where Ross- 
land had gone. 

“How long before you can prepare for the journey ?” 
he asked. 

“You mean—” 

“That we must start tonight or in the morning. 
I think we shall go through the cottonwoods over 
the old trail to Nome. Unless Rossland lied, Graham 
is somewhere out there on the Tanana trail.” 

Her hand pressed his arm. “We are going— back? 
Is that it, Alan?” 

“Yes, to Seattle. It is the one thing to do. You are 
not afraid?” 

“With you there—no.” 

“And you will return with me—when it is over ?” 

He was looking steadily ahead over the tundra. But 
he felt her cheek touch his shoulder, lightly as a 
feather. 

“Yes, I will come back with you.” j 


THE ALASKAN 


263 


“And you will be ready?” 

“I am ready now.” 

The sun-fire of the plains danced in his eyes; a cob¬ 
web of golden mist rising out of the earth, beckoning 
wraiths and undulating visions—the breath of life, of 
warmth, of growing things—all between him and the 
hidden cottonwoods; a joyous sea into which he wanted 
to plunge without another minute of waiting, as he 
felt the gentle touch of her cheek against his shoulder, 
and the weight of her hand on his arm. That she 
had come to him utterly was in the low surrender of 
her voice. She had ceased to fight—she had given to 
him the precious right to fight for her. 

It was this sense of her need and of her glorious 
faith in him, and of the obligation pressing with it 
that drove slowly back into him the grimmer realities 
of the day. Its horror surged upon him again, and 
the significance of what Rossland had said seemed 
fresher, clearer, even more terrible now that he was 
gone. Unconsciously the old lines of hatred crept into 
his face again as he looked steadily in the direction 
which the other man had taken, and he wondered how 
much of that same horror—of the unbelievable menace 
stealing upon her—Rossland had divulged to the girl 
who stood so quietly now at his side. Had he done 
right to let him go? Should he not have killed him, 
as he would have exterminated a serpent? For Ross¬ 
land had exulted; he was of Graham’s flesh and de¬ 
sires, a part of his foul soul, a defiler of womanhood 


264 THE ALASKAN 

and the one who had bargained to make possible the 
opportunity for an indescribable crime. It was not 
too late. He could still overtake him, out there in the 
hollows of the tundra— 

The pressure on his arm tightened. He looked down. 
Mary Standish had seen what was in his face, and 
there was something in her calmness that brought 
him to himself. He knew, in that moment, that Ross- 
land had told her a great deal. Yet she was not afraid, 
unless it was fear of what had been in his mind. 

“I am ready,’ ’ she reminded him. 

“We must wait for Stampede,” he said, reason re¬ 
turning to him. “He should be here sometime tonight, 
or in the morning. Now that Rossland is off my 
nerves, I can see how necessary it is to have someone 
like Stampede between us and—” 

He did not finish, but what he had intended to say 
was quite clear to her. She stood in the doorway, 
and he felt an almost uncontrollable desire to take 
her in his arms again. 

“He is between here and Tanana,” she said with a 
little gesture of her head. 

“Rossland told you that?” 

“Yes. And there are others with him, so many 
that he was amused when I told him you would not 
let them take me away.” 

“Then you were not afraid that I—I might let them 
have you?” 

“I have always been sure of what you would do since 


THE ALASKAN 265 

I opened that second letter at Ellen McCormick’s, 
Alan!” 

He caught the flash of her eyes, the gladness in 
them, and she was gone before he could find another 
word to say. Keok and Nawadlook were approaching 
hesitatingly, but now they hurried to meet her, Keok 
still grimly clutching the long knife; and beyond them, 
at the little window under the roof, he saw the ghostly 
face of old Sokwenna, like a death’s-head on guard. 
His blood ran a little faster. The emptiness of the 
tundras, the illimitable spaces without sign of human 
life, the vast stage waiting for its impending drama, 
with its sunshine, its song of birds, its whisper and 
breath of growing flowers, struck a new note in him, 
and he looked again at the little window where 
Sokwenna sat like a spirit from another world, warn¬ 
ing him in his silent and lifeless stare of something 
menacing and deadly creeping upon them out of that 
space which seemed so free of all evil. He beckoned 
to him and then entered his cabin, waiting while Sok¬ 
wenna crawled down from his post and came hobbling 
over the open, a crooked figure, bent like a baboon, 
witch-like in his great age, yet with sunken eyes that 
gleamed like little points of flame, and a quickness 
of movement that made Alan shiver as he watched 
him through the window. 

In a moment the old man entered. He was 
mumbling. He was saying, in that jumble of sound 
which it was difficult for even Alan to understand— 


266 THE ALASKAN 

and which Sokwenna had never given up for the mis¬ 
sionaries’ teachings—that he could hear feet and 
smell blood; and that the feet were many, and the 
blood was near, and that both smell and footfall were 
coming from the old kloof where yellow skulls still 
lay, dripping with the water that had once run red. 
Alan was one of the few who, by reason of much 
effort, had learned the story of the kloof from old 
Sokwenna; how, so long ago that Sokwenna was a 
young man, a hostile tribe had descended upon his 
people, killing the men and stealing the women; and 
how at last Sokwenna and a handful of his tribesmen 
fled south with what women were left and made a 
final stand in the kloof, and there, on a day that was 
golden and filled with the beauty of bird-song and 
flowers, had ambushed their enemies and killed them 
to a man. All were dead now, all but Sokwenna, 

For a space Alan was sorry he had called Sokwenna 
to his cabin. He was no longer the cheerful and gentle 
“old man” of his people; the old man who chortled 
with joy at the prettiness and play of Keok and Nawad- 
look, who loved birds and flowers and little children, 
and who had retained an impish boyhood along with 
his great age. He was changed. He stood before 
Alan an embodiment of fatalism, mumbling incoherent 
things in his breath, a spirit of evil omen lurking in 
his sunken eyes, and his thin hands gripping like 
bird-claws to his rifle. Alan threw off the uncom¬ 
fortable feeling that had gripped him for a moment. 


THE ALASKAN 


267 

and set him to an appointed task—the watching of the 
southward plain from the crest of a tall ridge two 
miles back on the Tanana trail. He was to return when 
the sun reached its horizon. 

Alan was inspired now by a great caution, a grow¬ 
ing premonition which stirred him with uneasiness, 
and he began his own preparations as soon as Sokwenna 
had started on his mission. The desire to leave at 
once, without the delay of an hour, pulled strong in 
him, but he forced himself to see the folly of such 
haste. He would be away many months, possibly a 
year this time. There was much to do, a mass of de¬ 
tail to attend to, a volume of instructions and advice 
to leave behind him. He must at least see Stampede, 
and it was necessary to write down certain laws for 
Tautuk and Amuk Toolik. As this work of prepara¬ 
tion progressed, and the premonition persisted in re¬ 
maining with him, he fell into a habit of repeating to 
himself the absurdity of fears and the impossibility 
of danger. He tried to make himself feel uncomfort¬ 
ably foolish at the thought of having ordered the herds¬ 
men in. In all probability Graham would not appear 
at all, he told himself, or at least not for many days— 
or weeks; and if he did come, it would be to war in a 
legal way, and not with murder. 

Yet his uneasiness did not leave him. As the hours 
passed and the afternoon lengthened, the invisible 
something urged him more strongly to take the trail 
beyond the cottonwoods, with Mary Standish at his 


268 THE ALASKAN 

side. Twice he saw her between noon and five o’clock, 
and by that time his writing was done. He looked at 
his guns carefully. He saw that his favorite rifle and 
automatic were working smoothly, and he called him¬ 
self a fool for filling his ammunition vest with an 
extravagant number of cartridges. He even carried 
an amount of this ammunition and two of his extra 
guns to Sokwenna’s cabin, with the thought that it was 
this cabin on the edge of the ravine which was best 
fitted for defense in the event of necessity. Possibly 
Stampede might have use for it, and for the guns, if 
Graham should come after he and Mary were well on 
their way to Nome. 

After supper, when the sun was throwing long 
shadows from the edge of the horizon, Alan came 
from a final survey of his cabin and the food which 
Wegaruk had prepared for his pack, and found Mary 
at the edge of the ravine, watching the twilight gather¬ 
ing where the coulee ran narrower and deeper be¬ 
tween the distant breasts of the tundra. 

“I am going to leave you for a little while,” he said. 
“But Sokwenna has returned, and you will not be 
alone.” 

“Where are you going?” 

“As far as the cottonwoods, I think.” 

“Then I am going with you.” 

“I expect to walk very fast.” 

“Not faster than I, Alan.” 


THE ALASKAN 


269 

“But I want to make sure the country is clear in 
that direction before twilight shuts out the distances.” 

“I will help you.” Her hand crept into his. “I am 
going with you, Alan,” she repeated. 

“Yes, I—think you are,” he laughed joyously, and 
suddenly he bent his head and pressed her hand to 
his lips, and in that way, with her hand in his, they 
set out over the trail which they had not traveled to- 
gether since the day he had come from Nome. 

There was a warm glow in her face, and some¬ 
thing beautifully soft and sweet in her eyes which 
she did not try to keep away from him. It made 
him forget the cottonwoods and the plains beyond, 
and his caution, and Sokwenna’s advice to guard care¬ 
fully against the hiding-places of Ghost Kloof and 
the country beyond. 

“I have been thinking a great deal today,” she 
was saying, “because you have left me so much alone. 
I have been thinking of you. And—my thoughts have 
given me a wonderful happiness.” 

“And I have been—in paradise,” he replied. 

“You do not think that I am wicked?” 

“I could sooner believe the sun would never come 
up again.” 

“Nor that I have been unwomanly?” 

“You are my dream of all that is glorious in woman' 
hood.” 

“Yet I have followed you—have thrust myself at 
you, fairly at your head, Alan.” 


THE ALASKAN 


270 

“For which I thank God,” he breathed devoutly. 

“And I have told you that I love you, and you have 
taken me in your arms, and have kissed me—” 

“Yes.” 

“And I am walking now with my hand in yours—* 

“And will continue to do so, if I can hold it.” 

“And I am another man’s wife,” she shuddered. 

“You are mine,” he declared doggedly. “You know 
it, and the Almighty God knows it. It is blasphemy 
to speak of yourself as Graham’s wife. You are 
legally entangled with him, and that is all. Heart and 
soul and body you are free.” 

“No, I am not free.” 

“But you are!” 

And then, after a moment, she whispered at his 
shoulder: “Alan, because you are the finest gentleman 
in all the world, I will tell you why I am not. It is 
because—heart and soul—I belong to you.” 

He dared not look at her, and feeling the struggle 
within him Mary Standish looked straight ahead with 
a wonderful smile on her lips and repeated softly, 
“Yes, the very finest gentleman in all the world!” 

Over the breasts of the tundra and the hollows be¬ 
tween they went, still hand in hand, and found them¬ 
selves talking of the colorings in the sky, and the 
birds, and flowers, and the twilight creeping in about 
them, while Alan scanned the shortening horizons for 
a sign of human life. One mile, and then another. 


THE ALASKAN 271 

and after that a third, and they were looking into gray 
gloom far ahead, where lay the kloof. 

It was strange that he should think of the letter 

now_the letter he had written to Ellen McCormick— 

but think of it he did, and said what was in his mind 
to Mary Standish, who was also looking with him into 
the wall of gloom that lay between them and the distant 
cottonwoods. 

“It seemed to me that I was not writing it to her, 
but to you” he said. “And I think that if you hadn’t 
come back to me I would have gone mad.” 

“I have the letter. It is here”—and she placed a 
hand upon her breast. “Do you remember what you 
wrote, Alan?” 

“That you meant more to me than life. 

“And that—particularly—you wanted Ellen Mc¬ 
Cormick to keep a tress of my hair for you if they 
found me.” 

He nodded. “When I sat across the table from you 
aboard the Nome, I worshiped it and didn t know it 
And since then—since I’ve had you here—every time 
I’ve looked at you—■” He stopped, choking the words 
back in his throat. 

“Say it, Alan.” 

“I’ve wanted to see it down,” he finished desper¬ 
ately. “Silly notion, isn’t it?” 

“Why is it?” she asked, her eyes widening a little. 
“If you love it, why is it a silly notion to want to see 
it down?” 


27 2 THE ALASKAN 

“Why, I thought possibly you might think it so,” he 
added lamely. 

Never had he heard anything sweeter than her 
laughter as she turned suddenly from him, so that 
the glow of the fallen sun was at her back, and with 
deft, swift fingers began loosening the coils of her 
hair until its radiant masses tumbled about her, stream¬ 
ing down her back in a silken glory that awed him 
with its beauty and drew from his lips a cry of glad¬ 
ness. 

She faced him, and in her eyes was the shining soft¬ 
ness that glowed in her hair. “Do you think it is 
nice, Alan?” 

He went to her and filled his hands with the heavy 
tresses and pressed them to his lips and face. 

Thus he stood when he felt the sudden shiver that 
ran through her. It was like a little shock. He heard 
the catch of her breath, and the hand which she had 
placed gently on his bowed head fell suddenly away. 
When he raised his head to look at her, she was staring 
past him into the deepening twilight of the tundra, 
and it seemed as if something had stricken her so that 
for a space she was powerless to speak or move. 

“What is it?” he cried, and whirled about, straining 
his eyes to see what had alarmed her; and as he looked, 
a deep, swift shadow sped over the earth, darkening 
the mellow twilight until it was somber gloom of night 
—and the midnight sun went out like a great, luminous 
lamp as a dense wall of purple cloud rolled up in an 


THE ALASKAN 273 

impenetrable curtain between it and the arctic world. 
Often he had seen this happen in the approach of sum¬ 
mer storm on the tundras, but never had the change 
seemed so swift as now. Where there had been golden 
light, he saw his companion’s face now pale in a sea 
of dusk. It was this miracle of arctic night, its sudden¬ 
ness and unexpectedness, that had startled her, he 
thought, and he laughed softly. 

But her hand clutched his arm. “I saw them,” she 
cried, her voice breaking. “I saw them—-out there 
against the sun—before the cloud came—and some 
of them were running, like animals—” 

“Shadows!” he exclaimed. “The long shadows of 
foxes running against the sun, or of the big gray rab¬ 
bits, or of a wolf and her half-grown sneaking away—” 
“No, no, they were not that,” she breathed tensely, 
and her fingers clung more fiercely to his arm. “They 
were not shadows. They were men!” 


CHAPTER XXIV 


TN THE moment of stillness between them, when 
their hearts seemed to have stopped beating that 
they might not lose the faintest whispering of the twi¬ 
light, a sound came to Alan, and he knew it was the 
toe of a boot striking against stone. Not a foot in 
his tribe would have made that sound; none but Stam¬ 
pede Smith’s or his own. 

“Were they many?” he asked. 

“I could not see. The sun was darkening. But five 
or six were running—” 

“Behind us?” 

“Yes.” 

“And they saw us?” 

“I think so. It was but a moment, and they were 
a part of the dusk.” 

He found her hand and held it closely. Her fingers 
clung to his, and he could hear her quick breathing as 
he unbuttoned the flap of his automatic holster. 

“You think they have come?” she whispered, and a 
cold dread was in her voice. 

“Possibly. My people would not appear from that 
direction. You are not afraid?” 

“No, no, I am not afraid.” 

274 



■MART SOBBED *AS THE <MAN SHE LOVED FACED WINGED DEATH 


















> 


THE ALASKAN 


275 


“Yet you are trembling.” 

“It is this strange gloom, Alan.” 

Never had the arctic twilight gone more completely. 
Not half a dozen times had he seen the phenomenon 
in all liis years on the tundras, where thunder-storm 
and the putting out of the summer sun until twilight 
thickens into the gloom of near-night is an occurrence 
so rare that it is more awesome than the weirdest play 
of the northern lights. It seemed to him now that what 
was happening was a miracle, the play of a mighty 
hand opening their way to salvation. An inky wall was 
shutting out the world where the glow of the mid¬ 
night sun should have been. It was spreading quickly; 
shadows became part of the gloom, and this gloom 
crept in, thickening, drawing nearer, until the tundra 
was a weird chaos, neither night nor twilight, chal¬ 
lenging vision until eyes strained futilely to penetrate 
its mystery. 

And as it gathered about them, enveloping them in 
their own narrowing circle of vision, Alan was think¬ 
ing quickly. It had taken him only a moment to ac¬ 
cept the significance of the running figures his com¬ 
panion had seen. Graham’s men were near, had seen 
them, and wete getting between them and the range. 
Possibly it was a scouting party, and if there were 
no more than five or six, the number which Mary had 
counted, he was quite sure of the situation. But there 
might be a dozen or fifty of them. It was possible 
Graham and Rossland were advancing upon the range 


276 THE ALASKAN 

with their entire force. He had at no time tried to 
analyze just what this force might be, except to assure 
himself that with the overwhelming influence behind 
him, both political and financial, and fired by a passion 
for Mary Standish that had revealed itself as little 
short of madness, Graham would hesitate at no con¬ 
vention of law or humanity to achieve his end. Prob¬ 
ably he was playing the game so that he would be 
shielded by the technicalities of the law, if it came to 
a tragic end. His gunmen would undoubtedly be im¬ 
pelled to a certain extent by an idea of authority. For 
Graham was an injured husband ‘‘rescuing” his wife, 
while he—Alan Holt—was the woman’s abductor and 
paramour, and a fit subject to be shot upon sight! 

His free hand gripped the butt of his pistol as he led 
the way straight ahead. The sudden gloom helped to 
hide in his face the horror he felt of what that “rescue 
would mean to Mary Standish; and then a cold and 
deadly definiteness possessed him, and every nerve 
in his body gathered itself in readiness for whatever 
might happen. 

If Graham’s men had seen them, and were getting 
between them and retreat, the neck of the trap lay 
ahead—and in this direction Alan walked so swiftly 
that the girl was almost running at his side. He could 
not hear her footsteps, so lightly they fell! her fingers 
were twined about his own, and he could feel the 
silken caress of her loose hair. For half a mile he kept 
on, watching for a moving shadow, listening for a 


THE ALASKAN 277 

sound. Then he stopped. He drew Mary into his 
arms and held her there, so that her head lay against 
his breast. She was panting, and he could feel and 
hear her thumping heart. He found her parted lips 
and kissed them. 

“You are not afraid?” he asked again. 

Her head made a fierce little negative movement 
against his breast. “No!” 

He laughed softly at the beautiful courage with 
which she lied. “Even if they saw us, and are Gra¬ 
ham’s men, we have given them the slip,” he com¬ 
forted her. “Now we will circle eastward back to the 
range. I am sorry I hurried you so. We will go more 
slowly.” 

“We must travel faster,” she insisted. “I want to 
run.” 

Her fingers sought his hand and clung to it again as 
they set out. At intervals they stopped, staring about 
them into nothingness, and listening. Twice Alan 
thought he heard sounds which did not belong to the 
night. The second time the little fingers tightened 
about his own, but his companion said no word, only 
her breath seemed to catch in her throat for an instant. 

At the end of another half-hour it was growing 
lighter, yet the breath of storm seemed nearer. The 
cool promise of it touched their cheeks, and about 
them were gathering whispers and eddies of a thirsty 
earth rousing to the sudden change. It was lighter be¬ 
cause the wall of cloud seemed to be distributing it- 


278 THE ALASKAN 

self over the whole heaven, thinning out where its 
solid opaqueness had lain against the sun. Alan could 
see the girl’s face and the cloud of her hair. Hollows 
and ridges of the tundra were taking more distinct 
shape when they came into a dip, and Alan recognized 
a thicket of willows behind which a pool was hidden. 

The thicket was only half a mile from home. A 
spring was near the edge of the willows, and to this 
he led the girl, made her a place to kneel, and showed 
her how to cup the cool water in the palms of her 
hands. While she inclined her head to drink, he held 
back her hair and rested with his lips pressed to it. 
He heard the trickle of water running between her 
fingers, her little laugh of half-pleasure, half-fear, 
which in another instant broke into a startled scream 
as he half gained his feet to meet a crashing body 
that catapulted at him from the concealment of the 
willows. 

A greater commotion in the thicket followed the 
attack; then another voice, crying out sharply, a 
second cry from Mary Standish, and he found himself 
on his knees, twisted backward and fighting desperately 
to loosen a pair of gigantic hands at his throat. He 
could hear the girl struggling, but she did not cry out 
again. In an instant, it seemed, his brain was reeling. 
He was conscious of a futile effort to reach his gun, 
and could see the face over him, grim and horrible in 
the gloom, as the merciless hands choked the life from 
him. Then he heard a shout, a loud shout, filled with 


THE ALASKAN 


279 

triumph and exultation as he was thrown back; his 
head seemed leaving his shoulders; his body crumbled, 
and almost spasmodically his leg shot out with the last 
strength that was in him. He was scarcely aware of 
the great gasp that followed, but the fingers loosened 
at his throat, the face disappeared, and the man who 
was killing him sank back. For a precious moment 
or two Alan did not move as he drew great breaths of 
air into his lungs. Then he felt for his pistol. The 
holster was empty. 

He could hear the panting of the girl, her sobbing 
breath very near him, and life and strength leaped back 
into his body. The man who had choked him was ad¬ 
vancing again, on hands and knees. In a flash Alan 
was up and on him like a lithe cat. His fist beat into 
a bearded face; he called out to Mary as he struck, and 
through his blows saw her where she had fallen to her 
knees, with a second hulk bending over her, almost 
in the water of the little spring from which she had 
been drinking. A mad curse leaped from his lips. He 
was ready to kill now; he wanted to kill—to destroy 
what was already under his hands that he might leap 
upon this other beast, who stood over Mary Standish, 
his hands twisted in her long hair. Dazed by blows 
that fell with the force of a club the bearded man s 
head sagged backward, and Alan’s fingers dug into his 
throat. It was a bull’s neck. He tried to break it. Ten 
seconds-—twenty—half a minute at the most and 
flesh and bone would have given way—but before the 


280 THE ALASKAN 

bearded man’s gasping cry was gone from his lips the 
second figure leaped upon Alan. 

He had no time to defend himself from this new 
attack. His strength was half gone, and a terrific blow 
sent him reeling. Blindly he reached out and grappled. 
Not until his arms met those of his fresh assailant did 
he realize how much of himself he had expended upon 
the other. A sickening horror filled his soul as he felt 
his weakness, and an involuntary moan broke from his 
lips. Even then he would have cut out his tongue to 
have silenced that sound, to have kept it from the girl. 
She was creeping on her hands and knees, but he could 
not see. Her long hair trailed in the trampled earth, 
and in the muddied water of the spring, and her hands 
were groping—groping—until they found what they 
were seeking. 

Then she rose to her feet, carrying the rock on 
which one of her hands had rested when she knelt 
to drink. The bearded man, bringing himself to his 
knees, reached out drunkenly, but she avoided him 
and poised herself over Alan and his assailant. The 
rock descended. Alan saw her then; he heard the one 
swift, terrible blow, and his enemy rolled away from 
him, limply and without sound. He staggered to his 
feet and for a moment caught the swaying girl in his 
arms. 

The bearded man was rising. He was half on his 
feet when Alan was at his throat again, and they went 
down together. The girl heard blows, then a heavier 


THE ALASKAN 


281 


one, and with an exclamation of triumph Alan stood 
up. By chance his hand had come in contact with his 
fallen pistol. He clicked the safety down; he was 
ready to shoot, ready to continue the fight with a gun. 

“Come,” he said. 

His voice was gasping, strangely unreal and thick. 
She came to him and put her hand in his again, and 
it was wet and sticky with tundra mud from the 
spring. Then they climbed to the swell of the plain, 
away from the pool and the willows. 

In the air about them, creeping up from the outer 
darkness of the strange twilight, were clearer whispers 
now, and with these sounds of storm, borne from the 
west, came a hallooing voice. It was answered from 
straight ahead. Alan held the muddied little hand 
closer in his own and set out for the range-houses, 
from which direction the last voice had come. He 
knew what was happening. Graham’s men were 
cleverer than he had supposed; they had encircled the 
tundra side of the range, and some of them were 
closing in on the willow pool, from which the tri¬ 
umphant shout of the bearded man’s companion had 
come. They were wondering why the call was not 
repeated, and were hallooing. 

Every nerve in Alan’s body was concentrated for 
swift and terrible action, for the desperateness of their 
situation had surged upon him like a breath of fire, 
unbelievable, and yet true. Back at the willows they 
would have killed him. The hands at his throat had 


282 THE ALASKAN 

sought his life. Wolves and not men were about them 
on the plain; wolves headed by two monsters of the 
human pack, Graham and Rossland. Murder and lust 
and mad passion were hidden in the darkness; law 
and order and civilization were hundreds of miles 
away. If Graham won, only the unmapped tundras 
would remember this night, as the deep, dark kloof 
remembered in its gloom the other tragedy of more 
than half a century ago. And the girl at his side, al¬ 
ready disheveled and muddied by their hands 

His mind could go no farther, and angry protest 
broke in a low cry from his lips. The girl thought 
it was because of the shadows that loomed up sud¬ 
denly in their path. There were two of them, and she, 
too, cried out as voices commanded them to stop. Alan 
caught a swift up-movement of an arm, but his own 
was quicker. Three spurts of flame darted in lightning 
flashes from his pistol, and the man who had raised 
his arm crumpled to the earth, while the other dis¬ 
solved swiftly into the storm-gloom. A moment later 
his wild shouts were assembling the pack, while the 
detonations of Alan’s pistol continued to roll over the 
tundra. 

The unexpectedness of the shots, their tragic effect, 
the falling of the stricken man and the flight of the 
other, brought no word from Mary Standish. But her 
breath was sobbing, and in the lifting of the purplish 
gloom she turned her face for an instant to Alan, 
tensely white, with wide-open eyes. Her hair covered 


THE ALASKAN 


283 

her like a shining veil, and where it clustered in a 
disheveled mass upon her breast Alan saw her hand 
thrusting itself forward from its clinging conceal¬ 
ment, and in it—to his amazement—was a pistol. He 
recognized the weapon—one of a brace of light 
automatics which his friend, Carl Lomen, had pre¬ 
sented to him several Christmas seasons ago. Pride 
and a strange exultation swept over him. Until now 
she had concealed the weapon, but all along she had 
prepared to fight—to fight with him against their 
enemies! He wanted to stop and take her in his arms, 
and with his kisses tell her how splendid she was. But 
instead of this he sped more swiftly ahead, and they 
came into the nigger-head bottom which lay in a 
narrow barrier between them and the range. 

Through this ran a trail scarcely wider than a 
wagon-track, made through the sea of hummocks and 
sedge-boles and mucky pitfalls by the axes and shovels 
of his people; finding this, Alan stopped for a moment, 
knowing that safety lay ahead of them. The girl 
leaned against him, and then was almost a dead weight 
in his arms. The last two hundred yards had taken the 
strength from her body. Her pale face dropped back, 
and Alan brushed the soft hair away from it, and 
kissed her lips and her eyes, while the pistol lay 
clenched against his breast. Even then, too hard-run 
to speak, she smiled at him, and Alan caught her up in 
his arms and darted into the narrow path which he 
knew their pursuers would not immediately find if 


284 THE ALASKAN 

they could get beyond their vision. He was joyously 
amazed at her lightness. She was like a child in his 
arms, a glorious little goddess hidden and smothered 
in her long hair, and he held her closer as he hurried 
toward the cabins, conscious of the soft tightening of 
her arms about his neck, feeling the sweet caress of 
her panting breath, strengthened and made happy by 
her helplessness. 

Thus they came out of the bottom as the first mist 
of slowly approaching rain touched his face. He could 
see farther now—half-way back over the narrow trail. 
He climbed a slope, and here Mary Standish slipped 
from his arms and stood with new strength, looking 
into his face. His breath was coming in little breaks, 
and he pointed. Faintly they could make out the 
shadows of the corral buildings. Beyond them were no 
lights penetrating the gloom from the windows of the 
range of houses. The silence of the place was death¬ 
like. 

And then something grew out of the earth almost 
at their feet. A hollow cry followed the movement, a 
cry that was ghostly and shivering, and loud enough 
only for them to hear, and Sokwenna stood at their 
side. He talked swiftly. Only Alan understood. There 
was something unearthly and spectral in his appear¬ 
ance; his hair and beard were wet; his eyes shot here 
and there in little points of fire; he was like a gnome, 
weirdly uncanny as he gestured and talked in his mono¬ 
tone while he watched the nigger-head bottom. When 


THE ALASKAN 


285 

he had finished, he did not wait for an answer, but 
turned and led the way swiftly toward the range 
houses. 

“What did he say?” asked the girl. 

“That he is glad we are back. He heard the shots 
and came to meet us.” 

“And what else?” she persisted. 

“Old Sokwenna is superstitious—and nervous. He 
said some things that you wouldn’t understand. You 
would probably think him mad if he told you the 
spirits of his comrades slain in the kloof many years 
ago were here with him tonight, warning him of things 
about to happen. Anyway, he has been cautious. No 
sooner were we out of sight than he hustled every 
woman and child in the village on their way to the 
mountains. Keok and Nawadlook wouldn’t go. I’m 
glad of that, for if they were pursued and overtaken 
by men like Graham and Rossland—” 

“Death would be better,” finished Mary Standish, 
and her hand clung more tightly to his arm. 

“Yes, I think so. But that can not happen now. Out 
in the open they had us at a disadvantage. But we can 
hold Sokwenna’s place until Stampede and the herds¬ 
men come. With two good rifles inside, they won’t dare 
to assault the cabin with their naked hands. The ad¬ 
vantage is all ours now; we can shoot, but they won’t 
risk the use of their rifles.” 

“Why?” 


286 


THE ALASKAN 


“Because you will be inside. Graham wants you 
alive, not dead. And bullets—” 

They had reached Sokwenna’s door, and in that 
moment they hesitated and turned their faces back to 
the gloom out of which they had fled. Voices came 
suddenly from beyond the corrals. There was no effort 
at concealment. The buildings were discovered, and 
men called out loudly and were answered from half a 
dozen points out on the tundra. They could hear run¬ 
ning feet and sharp commands; some were cursing 
where they were entangled among the nigger-heads, 
and the sound of hurrying foes came from the edge of 
the ravine. Alan’s heart stood still. There was some¬ 
thing terribly swift and businesslike in this gathering 
of their enemies. He could hear them at his cabin. 
Doors opened. A window fell in with a crash. Lights 
flared up through the gray mist. 

It was then, from the barricaded attic window over 
their heads, that Sokwenna’s rifle answered. A single 
shot, a shriek, and then a pale stream of flame leaped 
out from the window as the old warrior emptied his 
gun. Before the last of the five swift shots were 
fired, Alan was in the cabin, barring the door behind 
him. Shaded candles burned on the floor, and beside 
them crouched Keok and Nawadlook. A glance told 
him what Sokwenna had done. The room was an 
arsenal. Guns lay there, ready to be used; heaps of 
cartridges were piled near them, and in the eyes of 
Keok and Nawadlook blazed deep and steady fires as 


THE ALASKAN 


287 

they held shining cartridges between their fingers, 
ready to thrust them into the rifle chambers as fast as 
the guns were emptied. 

In the center of the room stood Mary Standish. The 
candles, shaded so they would not disclose the win¬ 
dows, faintly illumined her pale face and unbound 
hair and revealed the horror in her eyes as she looked 
at Alan. 

He was about to speak, to assure her there was no 
danger that Graham’s men would fire upon the cabin— 
when hell broke suddenly loose out in the night. The 
savage roar of guns answered Sokwenna’s fusillade, 
and a hail of bullets crashed against the log walls. Two 
of them found their way through the windows like 
hissing serpents, and with a single movement Alan 
was at Mary’s side and had crumpled her down on the 
floor beside Keok and Nawadlook. His face was white, 
his brain a furnace of sudden, consuming fire. 

“I thought they wouldn’t shoot at women,” he 
said, and his voice was terrifying in its strange hard¬ 
ness. “I was mistaken. And I am sure—now—that I 
understand.” 

With his rifle he cautiously approached the window. 
He was no longer guessing at an elusive truth. He 
knew what Graham was thinking, what he was plan¬ 
ning, what he intended to do, and the thing was appal¬ 
ling. Both he and Rossland knew there would be some 
way of sheltering Mary Standish in Sokwenna’s cabin; 
they were accepting a desperate gamble, believing that 


288 THE ALASKAN 

Alan Holt would find a safe place for her, while he 
fought until he fell. It was the finesse of clever 
scheming, nothing less than murder, and he, by this 
combination of circumstances and plot, was the victim 
marked for death. 

The shooting had stopped, and the silence that fol¬ 
lowed it held a significance for Alan. They were giv¬ 
ing him an allotted time in which to care for those 
under his protection. A trap-door was in the floor of 
Sokwenna’s cabin. It opened into a small storeroom 
and cellar, which in turn possessed an air vent leading 
to the outside, overlooking the ravine. In the candle- 
glow Alan saw the door of this trap propped open with 
a stick. Sokwenna, too, was clever. Sokwenna had 
foreseen. 

Crouched under the window, he looked at the girls. 
Keok, with a rifle in her hand, had crept to the foot of 
the ladder leading up to the attic, and began to climb 
it. She was going to Sokwenna, to load for him. Alan 
pointed to the open trap. 

“Quick, get into that!” he cried. “It is the only safe 
place. You can load there and hand out the guns.” 

Mary Standi sh looked at him steadily, but did not 
move. She was clutching a rifle in her hands. And 
Nawadlook did not move. But Keok climbed steadily 
and disappeared in the darkness above. 

“Go into the cellar!” commanded Alan. “Good God, 
if you don’t—” 

A smile lit up Mary’s face. In that hour of deadly 


THE ALASKAN 289 - 

peril it was like a ray of glorious light leading the 
way through blackness, a smile sweet and gentle and 
unafraid; and slowly she crept toward Alan, dragging 
the rifle in one hand and holding the little pistol in 
the other, and from his feet she still smiled up at him 
through the dishevelment of her shining hair, and in 
a quiet, little voice that thrilled him, she said, “I am 
going to help you fight.” 

Nawadlook came creeping after her, dragging 
another rifle and bearing an apron heavy with the 
weight of cartridges. 

And above, through the darkened loophole of the 
attic window, Sokwenna’s ferret eyes had caught the 
movement of a shadow in the gray mist, and his rifle 
sent its death-challenge once more to John Graham 
and his men. What followed struck a smile from 
Mary’s lips, and a moaning sob rose from her breast 
as she watched the man she loved rise up before the 
open window to face the winged death that was again 
beating a tattoo against the log walls of the cabin. 


CHAPTER XXV 


T HAT in the lust and passion of his designs and the 
arrogance of his power John Graham was not 
afraid to overstep all law and order, and that he be¬ 
lieved Holt would shelter Mary Standish from injury 
and death, there could no longer be a doubt after the 
first few swift moments following Sokwenna’s rifle¬ 
shots from the attic window. 

Through the window of the lower room, barricaded 
by the cautious old warrior until its aperture was not 
more than eight inches square, Alan thrust his rifle as 
the crash of gun-fire broke the gray and thickening 
mist of night. He could hear the thud and hiss of bul¬ 
lets; he heard them singing like angry bees as they 
passed with the swiftness of chain-lightning over the 
cabin roof, and their patter against the log walls was 
like the hollow drumming of knuckles against the side 
of a ripe watermelon. There was something fascinat¬ 
ing and almost gentle about that last sound. It did not 
seem that the horror of death was riding with it, and 
Alan lost all sense of fear as he stared in the direction 
from which the firing came, trying to make out 
shadows at which to shoot. Here and there he saw 
dim, white streaks, and at these he fired as fast as he 
290 


291 


THE ALASKAN 

could throw cartridges into the chamber and pull the 
trigger. Then he crouched down with the empty gun. 
It was Mary Standish who held out a freshly loaded 
weapon to him. Her face was waxen in its deathly 
pallor. Her eyes, staring at him so strangely, never 
for an instant leaving his face, were lustrous with the 
agony of fear that flamed in their depths. She was 
not afraid for herself. It was for him . His name was 
on her lips, a whisper unspoken, a breathless prayer, 
and in that instant a bullet sped through the opening 
in front of which he had stood a moment before, a 
hissing, writhing serpent of death that struck some¬ 
thing behind them in its venomous wrath. With a cry 
she flung up her arms about his bent head. 

“My God, they will kill you if you stand there!” 
she moaned. “Give me up to them, Alan. If you love 
me—give me up!” 

A sudden spurt of white dust shot out into the dim 
candle-glow, and then another, so near Nawadlook that 
his blood went cold. Bullets were finding their way 
through the moss and earth chinking between the logs 
of the cabin. His arms closed in a fierce embrace about 
the girl’s slim body, and before she could realize what 
was happening, he leaped to the trap with her and al¬ 
most flung her into its protection. Then he forced 
Nawadlook down beside her, and after them he thrust 
in the empty gun and the apron with its weight of 
cartridges. His face was demoniac in its command. 


292 THE ALASKAN 

“If you don’t stay there, I’ll open the door and go 
outside to fight! Do you understand? Stay there!” 

His clenched fist was in their faces, his voice almost 
a shout. He saw another white spurt of dust; the 
bullet crashed in tinware, and following the crash 
came a shriek from Keok in the attic. 

In that upper gloom Sokwenna’s gun had fallen 
with a clatter. The old warrior bent himself over, 
nearly double, and with his two withered hands was 
clutching his stomach. He was on his knees, and his 
breath suddenly came in a panting, gasping cry. Then 
he straightened slowly and said something reassuring 
to Keok, and faced the window again with the gun 
which she had loaded for him. 

The scream had scarcely gone from Keok’s lips 
when Alan was at the top of the ladder, calling her. 
She came to him through the stark blackness of the 
room, sobbing that Sokwenna was hit; and Alan 
reached out and seized her, and dragged her down, and 
placed her with Nawadlook and Mary Standish. 

From them he turned to the window, and his soul 
cried out madly for the power to see, to kill, to avenge. 
As if in answer to this prayer for light and vision he 
saw his cabin strangely illumined; dancing, yellow 
radiance silhouetted the windows, and a stream of it 
billowed out through an open door into the night. It 
was so bright he could see the rain-mist, scarcely 
heavier than a dense, slowly descending fog, a wet 
blanket of vapor moistening the earth. His heart 


THE ALASKAN 


293 

jumped as with each second the blaze of light in¬ 
creased. They had set fire to his cabin. They were no 
longer white men, but savages. 

He was terribly cool, even as his heart throbbed so 
violently. He watched with the eyes of a deadly hunter, 
wide-open over his rifle-barrel. Sokwenna was still. 
Probably he was dead. Keok was sobbing in the cellar- 
pit. Then he saw a shape growing in the illumination, 
three or four of them, moving, alive. He waited until 
they were clearer, and he knew what they were think¬ 
ing —that th§ bullet-riddled cabin had lost its power to 
fight. He prayed God it was Graham he was aiming 
at, and fired. The figure went down, sank into the 
earth as a dead man falls. Steadily he fired at the 
others—one, two, three, four—and two out of the 
four he hit, and the exultant thought flashed upon him 
that it was good shooting under the circumstances. 

He sprang back for another gun, and it was Mary 
who was waiting for him, head and shoulders out of 
the cellar-pit, the rifle in her hands. She was sobbing 
as she looked straight at him, yet without moisture or 
tears in her eyes. 

“Keep down!” he warned. “Keep down below the 
floor!” 

He guessed what was coming. He had shown his 
enemies that life still existed in the cabin, life with 
death in its hands, and now—from the shelter of the 
other cabins, from the darkness, from beyond the 
light of his flaming home, the rifle fire continued to 


294 THE ALASKAN 

grow until it filled the night with a horrible din. He 
flung himself face-down upon the floor, so that the 
lower log of the building protected him. No living 
thing could have stood up against what was happening 
in these moments. Bullets tore through the windows 
and between the moss-chinked logs, crashing against 
metal and glass and tinware; one of the candles sput¬ 
tered and went out, and in this hell Alan heard a cry 
and saw Mary Standish coming out of the cellar-pit 
toward him. He had flung himself down quickly, and 
she thought he was hit! He shrieked at her, and his 
heart froze with horror as he saw a heavy tress of her 
hair drop to the floor as she stood there in that fright¬ 
ful moment, white and glorious in the face of the gun¬ 
fire. Before she could move another step, he was at 
her side, and with her in his arms leaped into the pit. 

A bullet sang over them. He crushed her so close 
that for a breath or two life seemed to leave her body. 

A sudden draught of cool air struck his face. He 
missed Nawadlook. In the deeper gloom farther under 
the floor he heard her moving, and saw a faint square 
of light. She was creeping back. Her hands touched 
his arm. 

“We can get away—there!” she cried in a low voice. 
“I have opened the little door. We can crawl through 
it and into the ravine.” 

Her words and the square of light were an inspira¬ 
tion. He had not dreamed that Graham would turn 
the cabin into a death-hole, and Nawadlook’s words 


THE ALASKAN 


295 

filled him with a sudden thrilling hope. The rifle fire 
was dying away again as he gave voice to his plan in 
sharp, swift words. He would hold the cabin. As long 
as he was there Graham and his men would not dare to 
rush it. At least they would hesitate a considerable 
time before doing that. And meanwhile the girls could 
steal down into the ravine. There was no one on that 
side to intercept them, and both Keok and Nawadlook 
were well acquainted with the trails into the moun¬ 
tains. It would mean safety for them. He would re¬ 
main in the cabin, and fight, until Stampede Smith and 
the herdsmen came. 

The white face against his breast was cold and al¬ 
most expressionless. Something in it frightened him. 
He knew his argument had failed and that Mary 
Standish would not go; yet she did not answer him, 
nor did her lips move in the effort. 

“Go—for their sakes, if not for your own and 
mine,” he insisted, holding her away from him. “Good 
God, think what it will mean if beasts like those out 
there get hold of Keok and Nawadlook! Graham is 
your husband and will protect you for himself, but for 
them there will be no hope, no salvation, nothing but a 
fate more terrible than death. They will be like—like 
two beautiful lambs thrown among wolves—broken— 
destroyed —” 

Her eyes were burning with horror. Keok was sob¬ 
bing, and a moan which she bravely tried to smother 
in her breast came from Nawadlook. 


296 THE ALASKAN 

“And you!” whispered Mary. 

“I must remain here. It is the only way.” 

Dumbly she allowed him to lead her back with Keok 
and Nawadlook. Keok went through the opening first, 
then Nawadlook, and Mary Standish last. She did not 
touch him again. She made no movement toward him 
and said no word, and all he remembered of her when 
she was gone in the gloom was her eyes. In that last 
look she had given him her soul, and no whisper, no 
farewell caress came with it. 

“Go cautiously until you are out of the ravine, then 
hurry toward the mountains,” were his last words. 

He saw their forms fade into dim shadows, and the 
gray mist swallowed them. 

He hurried back, seized a loaded gun, and sprang to 
the window, knowing that he must continue to deal 
death until he was killed. Only in that way could he 
hold Graham back and give those who had escaped a 
chance for their lives. Cautiously he looked out over 
his gun barrel. His cabin was a furnace red with 
flame; streams of fire were licking out at the windows 
and through the door, and as he sought vainly for a 
movement of life, the crackling roar of it came to his 
ears, and so swiftly that his breath choked him, the 
pitch-filled walls became sheets of conflagration, until 
the cabin was a seething, red-hot torch of fire whose 
illumination was more dazzling than the sun of day. 

Out into this illumination suddenly stalked a 
figure waving a white sheet at the end of a long pole. 


THE ALASKAN* 


297 


It advanced slowly, a little hesitatingly at first, as if 
doubtful of what might happen; and then it stopped, 
full in the light, an easy mark for a rifle aimed from 
Sokwenna’s cabin. He saw who it was then, and drew 
in his rifle and watched the unexpected maneuver in 
amazement. The man was Rossland. In spite of the 
dramatic tenseness of the moment Alan could not re¬ 
press the grim smile that came to his lips. Rossland 
was a man of illogical resource, he meditated. Only a 
short time ago he had fled ignominiously through fear 
of personal violence, while now, with a courage that 
could not fail to rouse admiration, he was exposing 
himself to a swift and sudden death, protected only by 
the symbol of truce over his head. That he owed this 
symbol either regard or honor did not for an instant 
possess Alan. A murderer held it, a man even more 
vile than a murderer if such a creature existed on 
earth, and for such a man death was a righteous end. 
Only Rossland’s nerve, and what he might have to 
say, held back the vengeance within reach of Alan’s 
hand. 

He waited, and Rossland again advanced and did not 
stop until he was within a hundred feet of the cabin. 
A sudden disturbing thought flashed upon Alan as he 
heard his name called. He had seen no other figures, 
no other shadows beyond Rossland, and the burning 
cabin now clearly illumined the windows of Sok¬ 
wenna’s place. Was it conceivable that Rossland was 
merely a lure, and the instant he exposed himself in a 


298 THE ALASKAN 

parley a score of hidden rifles would reveal their 
treachery? He shuddered and held himself below the 
opening of the window. Graham and his men were 
more than capable of such a crime. 

Rossland’s voice rose above the crackle and roar of 
the burning cabin. “Alan Holt! Are you there? 

“Yes, I am here,” shouted Alan, “and I have a line 
on your heart, Rossland, and my finger is on the 
trigger. What do you want?” 

There was a moment of silence, as if the thought of 
what he was facing had at last stricken Rossland dumb. 
Then he said: “We are giving you a last chance, Holt. 
For God’s sake, don’t be a fool! The offer I made you 
today is still good. If you don’t accept it—the law 
must take its course.” 

“The law!” Alan’s voice was a savage cry. 

“Yes, the law. The law is with us. We have the 
proper authority to recover a stolen wife, a captive, a 
prisoner held in restraint with felonious intent. But we 
don’t want to press the law unless we are forced to do 
so. You and the old Eskimo have killed three of our 
men and wounded two others. That means the hang¬ 
man, if we take you alive. But we are willing to forget 
that if you will accept the offer I made you today. 
What do you say?” 

Alan was stunned. Speech failed him as he realized 
the monstrous assurance with which Graham and Ross¬ 
land were playing their game. And when he made no 
answer Rossland continued to drive home his argu- 


THE ALASKAN 


299 

ments, believing that at last Alan was at the point of 
surrender. 

Up in the dark attic the voices had come like ghost- 
land whispers to old Sokwenna. He lay huddled at the 
window, and the chill of death was creeping over him. 
But the voices roused him. They were not strange 
voices, but voices which came up out of a past of many 
years ago, calling upon him, urging him, persisting in 
his ears with cries of vengeance and of triumph, the 
call of familiar names, a moaning of women, a sobbing 
of children. Shadowy hands helped him, and a last 
time he raised himself to the window, and his eyes were 
filled with the glare of the burning cabin. He struggled 
to lift his rifle, and behind him he heard the exultation 
of his people as he rested it over the sill and with gasp¬ 
ing breath leveled it at something which moved be¬ 
tween him and the blazing light of that wonderful 
sun which was the burning cabin. And then, slowly 
and with difficulty, he pressed the trigger, and Sok- 
wenna’s last shot sped on its mission. 

At the sound of the shot Alan looked through the 
window. For a moment Rossland stood motionless. 
Then the pole in his hands wavered, drooped, and fell 
to the earth, and Rossland sank down after it making 
no sound, and lay a dark and huddled blot on the 
ground. 

The appalling swiftness and ease with which Ross¬ 
land had passed from life into death shocked every 
nerve in Alan’s body. Horror for a brief space stupe- 


300 THE ALASKAN 

fied him, and he continued to stare at the dark and 
motionless blot, forgetful of his own danger, while a 
grim and terrible silence followed the shot. And then 
what seemed to be a single cry broke that silence, 
though it was made up of many men’s voices. Deadly 
and thrilling, it was a message that set Alan into ac¬ 
tion. Rossland had been killed under a flag of truce, 
and even the men under Graham had something like 
respect for that symbol. He could expect no mercy 
nothing now but the most terrible of vengeance at 
their hands, and as he dodged back from the window 
he cursed Sokwenna under his breath, even as he felt 
the relief of knowing he was not dead. 

Before a shot had been fired from outside, he was 
up the ladder; in another moment he was bending over 
the huddled form of the old Eskimo. 

“Come below 1 ” he commanded. “We must be ready 
to leave through the cellar-pit.” 

His hand touched Sokwenna’s face; it hesitated, 
groped in the darkness, and then grew still over the old 
warrior’s heart. There was no tremor or beat of life 
in the aged beast. Sokwenna was dead. 

The guns of Graham’s men opened fire again. Volley 
after volley crashed into the cabin as Alan descended 
the ladder. He could hear bullets tearing through the 
chinks and windows as he turned quickly to the shelter 
of the pit. 

He was amazed to find that Mary Standish had re¬ 
turned and was waiting for him there. 


CHAPTER XXVI 


I N THE astonishment with which Mary’s unex¬ 
pected presence confused him for a moment, Alan 
stood at the edge of the trap, staring down at her pale 
face, heedless of the terrific gun-fire that was assailing 
the cabin. That she had not gone with Keok and 
Nawadlook, but had come back to him, filled him with 
instant dread, for the precious minutes he had fought 
for were lost, and the priceless time gained during the 
parley with Rossland counted for nothing. 

She saw his disappointment and his danger, and 
sprang up to seize his hand and pull him down beside 
her. 

“Of course you didn’t expect me to go,” she said, 
in a voice that no longer trembled or betrayed excite¬ 
ment. “You didn’t want me to be a coward. My place 
is with you.” 

He could make no answer to that, with her beautiful 
eyes looking at him as they were, but he felt his heart 
grow warmer and something rise up chokingly in his 
throat. 

“Sokwenna is dead, and Rossland lies out there- 
shot under a flag of truce,” he said. “We cant have 
many minutes left to us.” 

301 


302 THE ALASKAN 

He was looking at the square of light where the 
tunnel from the cellar-pit opened into the ravine. He 
had planned to escape through it—alone—and keep up 
a fight in the open, but with Mary at his side it would 
be a desperate gantlet to run. 

“Where are Keok and Nawadlook?” he asked. 

“On the tundra, hurrying for the mountains. I told 
them it was your plan that I should return to you. 
When they doubted, I threatened to give myself up un¬ 
less they did as I commanded them. And—Alan—the 
ravine is filled with the rain-mist, and dark—” She 
was holding his free hand closely to her breast. 

“It is our one chance,” he said. 

“And aren’t you glad—a little glad—that I didn’t 
run away without you?” 

Even then he saw the sweet and tremulous play of 
her lips as they smiled at him in the gloom, and heard 
the soft note in her voice that was almost playfully 
chiding; and the glory of her love as she had proved it 
to him there drew from him what he knew to be the 
truth. 

“Yes—I am glad. It is strange that I should be 
so happy in a moment like this. If they will give us a 
quarter of an hour—” 

He led the way quickly to the square of light and 
was first to creep forth into the thick mist. It was 
scarcely rain, yet he could feel the wet particles of it, 
and through this saturated gloom whining bullets cut 
like knives over his head. The blazing cabin illu- 


THE ALASKAN 


303 


mined the open on each side of Sokwenna’s place, but 
deepened the shadows in the ravine, and a few seconds 
later they stood hand in hand in the blanket of fog 
that hid the coulee. 

Suddenly the shots grew scattering above them, 
then ceased entirely. This was not what Alan had 
hoped for. Graham’s men, enraged and made desperate 
by Rossland’s death, would rush the cabin immediately. 
Scarcely had the thought leaped into his mind when he 
heard swiftly approaching shouts, the trampling of 
feet, and then the battering of some heavy object at 
the barricaded door of Sokwenna’s cabin. In another 
minute or two their escape would be discovered and a 
horde of men would pour down into the ravine. 

Mary tugged at his hand. “Let us hurry,” she 
pleaded. 

What happened then seemed madness to the girl, for 
Alan turned and with her hand held tightly in his 
started up the side of the ravine, apparently in the face 
of their enemies. Her heart throbbed with sudden fear 
when their course came almost within the circle of 
light made by the burning cabin. Like shadows they 
sped into the deeper shelter of the corral buildings, 
and not until they paused there did she understand the 
significance of the hazardous chance they had taken. 
Already Graham’s men were pouring into the ravine. 

“They won’t suspect we’ve doubled on them until 
it is too late,” said Alan exultantly. “We’ll make for 


3 04 THE ALASKAN 

the kloof. Stampede and the herdsmen should arrive 
within a few hours, and when that happens—” 

A stifled moan interrupted him. Half a dozen paces 
away a crumpled figure lay huddled against one of the 
corral gates. 

“He is hurt,” whispered Mary, after a moment of 
silence. 

“I hope so,” replied Alan pitilessly. “It will be un¬ 
fortunate for us if he lives to tell his comrades we have 
passed this way.” 

Something in his voice made the girl shiver. It was 
as if the vanishing point of mercy had been reached, 
and savages were at their backs. She heard the wounded 
man moan again as they stole through the deeper 
shadows of the corrals toward the nigger-head bottom. 
And then she noticed that the mist was no longer in her 
face. The sky was clearing. She could see Alan more 
clearly, and when they came to the narrow trail over 
which they had fled once before that night it reached 
out ahead of them like a thin, dark ribbon. Scarcely 
had they reached this point when a rifle shot sounded 
not far behind. It was followed by a second and a 
third, and after that came a shout. It was not a loud 
shout. There was something strained and ghastly 
about it, and yet it came distinctly to them. 

“The wounded man,” said Alan, in a voice of dis¬ 
may. “He is calling the others. I should have killed 
him!” 

He traveled at a half-trot, and the girl ran lightly at 


THE ALASKAN 


305 

his side. All her courage and endurance had returned. 
She breathed easily and quickened her steps, so that 
she was setting the pace for Alan. They passed along 
the crest of the ridge under which lay the willows 
and the pool, and at the end of this they paused to 
rest and listen. Trained to the varied night whisper¬ 
ings of the tundras Alan’s ears caught faint sounds 
which his companion did not hear. The wounded man 
had succeeded in giving his message, and pursuers 
were scattering over the plain behind them. 

“Can you run a little farther?” he asked. 

“Where?” 

He pointed, and she darted ahead of him, her dark 
hair streaming in a cloud that began to catch a faint 
luster of increasing light. Alan ran a little behind her. 
He was afraid of the light. Only gloom had saved 
them this night, and if the darkness of mist and fog 
and cloud gave way to clear twilight and the sun-glow 
of approaching day before they reached the kloof he 
would have to fight in the open. With Stampede at his 
side he would have welcomed such an opportunity of 
matching rifles with their enemies, for there were many 
vantage points in the open tundra from which they 
might have defied assault. But the nearness of the 
girl frightened him. She, after all, was the hunted 
thing. He was only an incident. From him could be 
exacted nothing more than the price of death; he would 
be made to pay that, as Sokwenna had paid. For her 
remained the unspeakable horror of Graham’s lust and 


306 THE ALASKAN 

passion. But if they could reach the kloof, and the hid¬ 
ing-place in the face of the cliff, they could laugh at 
Graham’s pack of beasts while they waited for the 
swift vengeance that would come with Stampede and 
the herdsmen. 

He watched the sky. It was clearing steadily. Even 
the mists in the hollows were beginning to melt away, 
and in place of their dissolution came faintly rose- 
tinted lights. It was the hour of dawn; the sun sent 
a golden glow over the disintegrating curtain of gloom 
that still lay between it and the tundras, and objects 
a hundred paces away no longer held shadow or illu- 
sionment. 

The girl did not pause, but continued to run lightly 
and with surprising speed, heeding only the direction 
which he gave her. Her endurance amazed him. And 
he knew that without questioning him she had guessed 
the truth of what lay behind them. Then, all at once, 
she stopped, swayed like a reed, and would have fallen 
if his arms had not caught her. 

“Splendid!” he cried. 

She lay gasping for breath, her face against his 
breast. Her heart was a swiftly beating little dynamo. 

They had gained the edge of a shallow ravine that 
reached within half a mile of the kloof. It was this 
shelter he had hoped for, and Mary’s splendid courage 
had won it for them. 

He picked her up in his arms and carried her again, 
as he had carried her through the nigger-head bottom. 


THE ALASKAN 


307 

Every minute, every foot of progress, counted now. 
Range of vision was widening. Pools of sunlight were 
flecking the plains. In another quarter of an hour 
moving objects would be distinctly visible a mile away. 

With his precious burden in his arms, her lips so 
near that he could feel their breath, her heart throb¬ 
bing, he became suddenly conscious of the incongruity 
of the bird-song that was wakening all about them. It 
seemed inconceivable that this day, glorious in its 
freshness, and welcomed by the glad voice of all living 
things, should be a day of tragedy, of horror, and of 
impending doom for him. He wanted to shout out 
his protest and say that it was all a lie, and it seemed 
absurd that he should handicap himself with the weight 
and inconvenient bulk of his rifle when his arms 
wanted to hold only that softer treasure which they 
bore. 

In a little while Mary was traveling at his side again. 
And from then on he climbed at intervals to the higher 
swellings of the gully edge and scanned the tundra. 
Twice he saw men, and from their movements he con¬ 
cluded their enemies believed they were hidden some¬ 
where on the tundra not far from the range-houses. 

Three-quarters of an hour later they came to the 
end of the shallow ravine, and half a mile of level plain 
lay between them and the kloof. For a space they 
rested, and in this interval Mary smoothed her long 
hair and plaited it in two braids. In these moments 
Alan encouraged her, but he did not lie. He told her 


THE ALASKAN 


308 

the half-mile of tundra was their greatest hazard, and 
described the risks they would run. Carefully he ex¬ 
plained what she was to do under certain circum¬ 
stances. There was scarcely a chance they could cross 
it unobserved, but they might be so far ahead of the 
searchers that they could beat them out to the kloof. 
If enemies appeared between them and the kloof, it 
would be necessary to find a dip or shelter of rock, and 
fight; and if pursuers from behind succeeded in out¬ 
stripping them in the race, she was to continue in the 
direction of the kloof as fast as she could go, while he 
followed more slowly, holding Graham’s men back 
with his rifle until she reached the edge of the gorge. 
After that he would come to her as swiftly as he could 
run. 

They started. Within five minutes they were on the 
floor of the tundra. About them in all directions 
stretched the sunlit plains. Half a mile back toward the 
range were moving figures; farther west were others, 
and eastward, almost at the edge of the ravine, were 
two men who would have discovered them in another 
moment if they had not descended into the hollow. 
Alan could see them kneeling to drink at the little coulee 
which ran through it. 

“Don’t hurry,” he said, with a sudden swift thought. 
“Keep parallel with me and a distance away. They 
may not discover you are a woman and possibly may 
think we are searchers like themselves. Stop when I 
stop. Follow my movements.” 


THE ALASKAN 


309 


“Yes, sir!” 

Now, in the sunlight, she was not afraid. Her 
cheeks were flushed, her eyes bright as stars as she 
nodded at him. Her face and hands were soiled with 
muck-stain, her dress spotted and torn, and looking at 
her thus Alan laughed and cried out softly: 

“You beautiful little vagabond!” 

She sent the laugh back, a soft, sweet laugh to give 
him courage, and after that she watched him closely, 
falling in with his scheme so cleverly that her action 
was better than his own—and so they had made their 
way over a third of the plain when Alan came toward 
her suddenly and cried, “Now, run!” 

A glance showed her what was happening. The 
two men had come out of the ravine and were running 
toward them. 

Swift as a bird she was ahead of Alan, making 
for a pinnacle of rock which he had pointed out to her 
at the edge of the kloof. 

Close behind her, he said: “Don’t hesitate a second. 
Keep on going. When they are a little nearer I am 
going to kill them. But you mustn’t stop.” 

At intervals he looked behind him. The two men 
were gaining rapidly. He measured the time when 
less than two hundred yards would separate them. 
Then he drew close to Mary’s side. 

“See that level place ahead? We’ll cross it in another 
minute or two. When they come to it I’m going to 
stop, and catch them where they can’t find shelter. But 


THE ALASKAN 


310 

you must keep on going. I’ll overtake you by the time 
you reach the edge of the kloof.” 

She made no answer, but ran faster; and when 
they had passed the level space she heard his footsteps 
growing fainter, and her heart was ready to choke her 
when she knew the time had come for him to turn upon 
their enemies. But in her mind burned the low words 
of his command, his warning, and she did not look 
back, but kept her eyes on the pinnacle of rock, which 
was now very near. She had almost reached it when 
the first shot came from behind her. 

Without making a sound that would alarm her, 
Alan had stumbled, and made pretense of falling. He 
lay upon his face for a moment, as if stunned, and then 
rose to his knees. An instant too late Graham’s men 
saw his ruse when his leveled rifle gleamed in the sun¬ 
shine. The speed of their pursuit was their undoing. 
Trying to catch themselves so that they might use their 
rifles, or fling themselves upon the ground, they 
brought themselves into a brief but deadly interval of 
inaction, and in that flash one of the men went down 
under Alan’s first shot. Before he could fire again the 
second had flattened himself upon the earth, and swift 
as a fox Alan was on his feet and racing for the kloof. 
Mary stood with her back against the huge rock, gasp¬ 
ing for breath, when he joined her. A bullet sang over 
their heads with its angry menace. He did not return 
the fire, but drew the girl quickly behind the rock. 

“He won’t dare to stand up until the others join 


THE ALASKAN 


3 ii 

him,” he encouraged her. “We’re beating them to it, 
little girl! If you can keep up a few minutes longer—” 

She smiled at him, even as she struggled to regain 
her breath. It seemed to her there was no way of 
descending into the chaos of rock between the gloomy 
walls of the kloof, and she gave a little cry when Alan 
caught her by her hands and lowered her over the 
face of a ledge to a table-like escarpment below. He 
laughed at her fear when he dropped down beside her, 
and held her close as they crept back under the shelv¬ 
ing face of the cliff to a hidden path that led down¬ 
ward, with a yawning chasm at their side. The trail 
widened as they descended, and at the last they reached 
the bottom, with the gloom and shelter of a million- 
year-old crevasse hovering over them. Grim and 
monstrous rocks, black and slippery with age, lay 
about them, and among these they picked their way, 
while the trickle and drip of water and the flesh-like 
clamminess of the air sent a strange shiver of awe 
through Mary Standish. There was no life here— 
only an age-old whisper that seemed a part of death; 
and when voices came from above, where Graham’s 
men were gathering, they were ghostly and far away. 

But here, too, was refuge and safety. Mary could 
feel it as they picked their way through the chill and 
gloom that lay in the silent passages between the 
Gargantuan rocks. When her hands touched their 
naked sides an uncontrollable impulse made her shrink 
closer to Alan, even though she sensed the protection of 


THE ALASKAN 


3 12 

their presence. They were like colossi, carved by hands 
long dead, and now guarded by spirits whose voices 
guttered low and secretly in the mysterious drip and 
trickle of unseen water. This was the haunted place. 
In this chasm death and vengeance had glutted them¬ 
selves long before she was born; and when a rock 
crashed behind them, accidentally sent down by one 
of the men above, a cry broke from her lips. She was 
frightened, and in a way she had never known before. 
It was not death she feared here, nor the horror from 
which she had escaped above, but something unknown 
and indescribable, for which she would never be able 
to give a reason. She clung to Alan, and when at last 
the narrow fissure widened over their heads, and light 
came down and softened their way, he saw that her 
face was deathly white. 

“We are almost there/’ he comforted. “And—some 
day—you will love this gloomy kloof as I love it, and 
we will travel it together all the way to the mountains.” 

A few minutes later they came to an avalanche of 
broken sandstone that was heaped half-way up the face 
of the precipitous wall, and up this climbed until they 
came to a level shelf of rock, and back of this was a 
great depression in the rock, forty feet deep and half 
as wide, with a floor as level as a table and covered 
with soft white sand. Mary would never forget her 
first glimpse of this place; it was unreal, strange, as 
if a band of outlaw fairies had brought the white sand 
for a carpet, and had made this their hiding-place, where 


THE ALASKAN 


313 

wind and rain and snow could never blow. And up the 
face of the cavern, as if to make her thought more real, 
led a ragged fissure which it seemed to her only fairies* 
feet could travel, and which ended at the level of the 
plain. So they were tundra fairies, coming down from 
flowers and sunlight through that fissure, and it was 
from the evil spirits in the kloof itself that they must 
have hidden themselves. Something in the humor and 
gentle thought of it all made her smile at Alan. 
But his face had turned suddenly grim, and she looked 
up the kloof, where they had traveled through danger 
and come to safety. And then she saw that which froze 
all thought of fairies out of her heart. 

Men were coming through the chaos and upheaval of 
rock. There were many of them, appearing out of the 
darker neck of the gorge into the clearer light, and at 
their head was a man upon whom Mary’s eyes fixed 
themselves in horror. White-faced she looked at Alan. 
He had guessed the truth. 

“That man in front?” he asked. 

She nodded. “Yes.” 

“Is John Graham.” 

He heard the words choking in her throat. 

“Yes, John Graham.” 

He swung his rifle slowly, his eyes burning with a 
steely fire. 

“I think,” he said, “that from here I can easily kill 
him!” 

Her hand touched his arm; she was looking into his 


THE ALASKAN 


314 

eyes. Fear had gone out of them, and in its place was 
a soft and gentle radiance, a prayer to him. 

“I am thinking of tomorrow—the next day—the 
years and years to come, with you,” she whispered. 
“Alan, you can’t kill John Graham—not until God 
shows us it is the only thing left for us to do. You 
can t— 

The crash of a rifle between the rock walls inter¬ 
rupted her. The snarl of a bullet followed the shot. 
She heard it strike, and her heart stopped beating, and 
the rigidity of death came into her limbs and body as 
she saw the swift and terrible change in the stricken face 
of the man she loved. He tried to smile at her, even as 
a red blot came where the streak of gray in his hair 
touched his forehead. And then he crumpled down at 
her feet, and his rifle rattled against the rocks. 

She knew it was death. Something seemed to burst 
in her head and fill her brain with the roar of a flood. 
She screamed. Even the men below hesitated and their 
hearts jumped with a new sensation as the terrible 
cry of a woman rang between the rock walls of the 
chasm. And following the cry a voice came down to 
them. 

“John Graham, I’m going to kill you —kill you—■* 

And snatching up the fallen rifle Mary Standish set 
herself to the task of vengeance. 


CHAPTER XXVir 


CHE waited. The ferocity of a mother defend- 
^ ing her young filled her soul, and she moaned in 
her grief and despair as the seconds passed. But she 
did not fire blindly, for she knew she must kill John 
Graham. The troublesome thing was a strange film 
that persisted in gathering before her eyes, something 
she tried to brush away, but which obstinately refused 
to go. She did not know she was sobbing as she looked 
over the rifle barrel. The figures came swiftly, but she 
had lost sight of John Graham. They reached the up¬ 
heaval of shattered rock and began climbing it, and in 
her desire to make out the man she hated she stood 
above the rampart that had sheltered her. The men 
looked alike, jumping and dodging like so many big 
tundra hares as they came nearer, and suddenly it 
occurred to her that all of them were John Grahams, 
and that she must kill swiftly and accurately. Only 
the hiding fairies might have guessed how her reason 
trembled and almost fell in those moments when she 
began firing. Certainly John Graham and his men 
did not, for her first shot was a lucky one, and a man 
slipped down among the rocks at the crack of it. After 
that she continued to fire until the responseless click 
315 


316 THE ALASKAN 

of the hammer told her the gun was empty. The ex¬ 
plosions and the shock against her slight shoulder 
cleared her vision and her brain. She saw the men still 
coming, and they were so near she could see their faces 
clearly. And again her soul cried out in its desire to 
kill John Graham. 

She turned, and for an instant fell upon her knees 
beside Alan. His face was hidden in his arm. Swiftly 
she tore his automatic from its holster, and sprang 
back to her rock. There was no time to wait or choose 
now, for his murderers were almost upon her. With 
all her strength she tried to fire accurately, but Alan's 
big gun leaped and twisted in her hand as she poured 
its fire wildly down among the rocks until it was 
empty. Her own smaller weapon she had lost some¬ 
where in the race to the kloof, and now when she 
found she had fired her last shot she waited through 
another instant of horror, until she was striking at 
faces that came within the reach of her arm. And 
then, like a monster created suddenly by an evil spirit, 
Graham was at her side. She had a moment’s vision 
of his cruel, exultant face, his eyes blazing with a 
passion that was almost madness, his powerful body 
lunging upon her. Then his arms came about her. 
She could feel herself crushing inside them, and fought 
against their cruel pressure, then broke limply and hung 
a resistless weight against him. She was not uncon¬ 
scious, but her strength was gone, and if the arms had 
closed a little more they would have killed her. 


THE ALASKAN 


317 

And she could hear—clearly. She heard suddenly 
the shots that came from up the kloof, scattered shots, 
then many of them, and after that the strange, wild 
cries that only the Eskimo herdsmen make. 

Graham’s arms relaxed. His eyes swept the fairies’ 
hiding-place with its white sand floor, and fierce joy 
lit up his face. 

“Martens, it couldn’t happen in a better place,” he 
said to a man who stood near him. “Leave me five 
men. Take the others and help Schneider. If you 
don’t clean them out, retreat this way, and six rifles 
from this ambuscade will do the business in a hurry/* 

Mary heard the names of the men called who were 
to stay. The others hurried away. The firing in 
the kloof was steady now. But there were no cries, no 
shouts—nothing but the ominous crack of the rifles. 

Graham’s arms closed about her again. Then he 
picked her up and carried her back into the cavern, 
and in a place where the rock wall sagged inward, 
making a pocket of gloom which was shut out from the 
light of day, he laid her upon the carpet of sand. 

Where the erosion of many centuries of dripping 
water had eaten its first step in the making of the 
ragged fissure a fairy had begun to climb down from 
the edge of the tundra. He was a swift and agile fairy, 
very red in the face, breathing fast from hard run¬ 
ning, but making not a sound as he came like a gopher 
where it seemed no living thing could find a hold. And 
the fairy was Stampede Smith. 


THE ALASKAN 


3i8 

From the lips of the kloof he had seen the last few 
seconds of the tragedy below, and where death would 
have claimed him in a more reasonable moment he 
came down in safety now. In his finger-ends was the 
old tingling of years ago, and in his blood the thrill 
which he had thought was long dead—the thrill of 
looking over leveled guns into the eyes of other men. 
Time had rolled back, and he was the old Stampede 
Smith. He saw under him lust and passion and mur¬ 
der, as in other days he had seen them, and between 
him and desire there was neither law nor conscience 
to bar the way, and his dream—a last great fight—was 
here to fill the final unwritten page of a life’s drama 
that was almost closed. And what a fight, if he could 
make that carpet of soft, white sand unheard and un¬ 
seen. Six to one! Six men with guns at their sides 
and rifles in their hands. What a glorious end it would 
be, for a woman—and Alan Holt! 

He blessed the firing up the kloof which kept the 
men’s faces turned that way; he thanked God for the 
sound of combat, which made the scraping of rock and 
the rattle of stones under his feet unheard. He was 
almost down when a larger rock broke loose, and fell 
to the ledge. Two of the men turned, but in that 
same instant came a more thrilling interruption. A 
cry, a shrill scream, a woman’s voice filled with mad¬ 
ness and despair, came from the depth of the cavern, 
and the five men stared in the direction of its agony. 
Close upon the cries came Mary Standish, with Graham 


THE ALASKAN 


319 

behind her, reaching out his hands for her. The girl’s 
hair was flying, her face the color of the white sand, 
and Graham’s eyes were the eyes of a demon forgetful 
of all else but her. He caught her. The slim body 
crumpled in his arms again while pitifully weak hands 
beat futilely in his face. 

And then came a cry such as no man had ever heard 
in Ghost Kloof before. 

It was Stampede Smith. A sheer twenty feet he 
had leaped to the carpet of sand, and as he jumped his 
hands whipped out his two guns, and scarcely had his 
feet touched the floor of the soft pocket in the ledge 
when death crashed from them swift as lightning 
flashes, and three of the five were tottering or falling 
before the other two could draw or swing a rifle. Only 
one of them had fired a shot. The other went down 
as if his legs had been knocked from under him by a 
club, and the one who fired bent forward then, as if 
making a bow to death, and pitched on his face. 

And then Stampede Smith whirled upon John 
Graham. 

During these few swift seconds Graham had stood 
stunned, with the girl crushed against his breast. He 
was behind her, sheltered by her body, her head pro¬ 
tecting his heart, and as Stampede turned he was 
drawing a gun, his dark face blazing with the fiendish 
knowledge that the other could not shoot without killing 
the girl. The horror of the situation gripped Stam¬ 
pede. He saw Graham’s pistol rise slowly and de- 


320 


THE ALASKAN 


liberately. He watched it, fascinated. And the look 
in Graham’s face was the cold and unexcited triumph 
of a devil. Stampede saw only that face. It was 
four inches—perhaps five—away from the girl’s. 
There was only that—and the extending arm, the 
crooking finger, the black mouth of the automatic seek¬ 
ing his heart. And then, in that last second, straight 
into the girl’s staring eyes blazed Stampede’s gun, 
and the four inches of leering face behind her was 
suddenly blotted out. It was Stampede, and not the 
girl, who closed his eyes then; and when he opened 
them and saw Mary Standish sobbing over Alan’s 
body, and Graham lying face down in the sand, he 
reverently raised the gun from which he had fired the 
last shot, and pressed its hot barrel to his thin lips. 

Then he went to Alan. He raised the limp head, 
while Mary bowed her face in her hands. In her 
anguish she prayed that she, too, might die, for in this 
hour of triumph over Graham there was no hope or 
joy for her. Alan was gone. Only death could’have 
come with that terrible red blot on his forehead, just 
under the gray streak in his hair. And without him 
there was no longer a reason for her to live. 

She reached out her arms. “Give him to me,” she 
whispered. “Give him to me.” 

Through the agony that burned in her eyes she did 
not see the look in Stampede’s face. But she heard 
his voice. 

“It wasn’t a bullet that hit him,” Stampede was 


321 


THE ALASKAN 

saying. “The bullet hit a rock, an’ it was a chip from 
the rock that caught him square between the eyes. He 
isn’t dead, and he ain't going to die!" 

How many weeks or months or years it was after 
his last memory of the fairies’ hiding-place before he 
came back to life, Alan could make no manner of 
guess. But he did know that for a long, long time 
he was riding through space on a soft, white cloud, 
vainly trying to overtake a girl with streaming hair 
who fled on another cloud ahead of him; and at last 
this cloud broke up, like a great cake of ice, and the 
girl plunged into the immeasurable depths over which 
they were sailing, and he leaped after her. Then came 
strange lights, and darkness, and sounds like the clash¬ 
ing of cymbals, and voices; and after those things a 
long sleep, from which he opened his eyes to find him¬ 
self in a bed, and a face very near, with shining eyes 
that looked at him through a sea of tears. 

And a voice whispered to him, sweetly, softly, joy¬ 
ously, “Alan!” 

He tried to reach up his arms. The face came 
nearer; it was pressed against his own, soft arms 
crept about him, softer lips kissed his mouth and 
eyes, and sobbing whispers came with their love, and 
he knew the end of the race had come, and he had 
won. 

This was the fifth day after the fight in the kloof; 
and on the sixth he sat up in his bed, bolstered 
with pillows, and Stampede came to see him, and then 


THE ALASKAN 


322 

Keok and Nawadlook and Tatpan and Topkok and 
Wegaruk, his old housekeeper, and only for a few 
minutes at a time was Mary away from him. But 
Tautuk and Amuk Toolik did not come, and he saw 
the strange change in Keok, and knew that they were 
dead. Yet he dreaded to ask the question, for more 
than any others of his people did he love these two 
missing comrades of the tundras. 

It was Stampede who first told him in detail what 
had happened—but he would say little of the fight on 
the ledge, and it was Mary who told him of that. 

“Graham had over thirty men with him, and only 
ten got away,” he said. “We have buried sixteen 
and are caring for seven wounded at the corrals. Now 
that Graham is dead, they’re frightened stiff—afraid 
we’re going to hand them over to the law. And with¬ 
out Graham or Rossland to fight for them, they know 
they’re lost.” 

“And our men—my people ?” asked Alan faintly. 

“Fought like devils.” 

“Yes, I know. But—” 

“They didn’t rest an hour in coming from the 
mountains.” 

“You know what I mean, Stampede.” 

“Not many, Alan. Seven were killed, including 
Sokwenna,” and he counted over the names of the 
slain. Tautuk and Amuk Toolik were not among 
them. 

“And Tautuk?” 


THE ALASKAN 


323 

“He is wounded. Missed death by an inch, and it 
has almost killed Keok. She is with him night and 
day, and as jealous as a little cat if anyone else 
attempts to do anything for him. ,, 

“Then—I am glad Tautuk was hit,” smiled Alan. 
And he asked, “Where is Amuk Toolik?” 

Stampede hung his head and blushed like a boy. 

“You’ll have to ask her, Alan.” 

And a little later Alan put the question to Mary. 

She, too, blushed, and in her eyes was a mysterious 
radiance that puzzled him. 

“You must wait,” she said. 

Beyond that she would say no word, though he 
pulled her head down, and with his hands in her soft, 
smooth hair threatened to hold her until she told him 
the secret. Her answer was a satisfied little sigh, and 
she nestled her pink face against his neck, and whis¬ 
pered that she was content to accept the punishment. 
So where Amuk Toolik had gone, and what he was 
doing, still remained a mystery. 

A little later he knew he had guessed the truth. 

“I don’t need a doctor,” he said, “but it was mighty 
thoughtful of you to send Amuk Toolik for one.” 
Then he caught himself suddenly. “What a senseless 
fool I am! Of course there are others who need a 
doctor more than I do.” 

Mary nodded. “But I was thinking chiefly of you 
when I sent Amuk Toolik to Tanana. He is riding 
Kauk, and should return almost any time now.” And 


THE ALASKAN 


3^4 

she turned her face away so that he could see only the 
pink tip of her ear. 

“Very soon I will be on my feet and ready for 
travel,” he said. “Then we will start for the States, 
as we planned.” 

“You will have to go alone, Alan, for I shall be too 
busy fitting up the new house,” she replied, in such a 
quiet, composed, little voice that he was stunned. “I 
have already given orders for the cutting of timber 
in the foothills, and Stampede and Amuk Toolik will 
begin construction very soon. I am sorry you find 
your business in the States so important, Alan. It will 
be a little lonesome with you away.” 

He gasped. “Mary!” 

She did not turn. “Mary!” 

He could see again that little, heart-like throb in her 
throat when she faced him. 

And then he learned the secret, softly whispered, 
with sweet, warm lips pressed to his. 

“It wasn’t a doctor I sent for, Alan. It was a min¬ 
ister. We need one to marry Stampede and Nawadlook 
and Tautuk and Keok. Of course, you and I can 
wait—” 

But she never finished, for her lips were smothered 
with a love that brought a little sob of joy from her 
heart. 

And then she whispered things to him which he had 
never guessed of Mary Standish, and never quite hoped 
to hear. She was a little wild, a little reckless it may 


THE ALASKAN 3^5 

be, but what she said filled him with a happiness which 
he believed had never come to any other man in the 
world. It was not her desire to return to the States 
at all. She never wanted to return. She wanted noth¬ 
ing down there, nothing that the Standish fortune- 
builders had left her, unless he could find some way 
of using it for the good of Alaska. And even then 
she was afraid it might lead to the breaking of her 
dream. For there was only one thing that would make 
her happy, and that was his world. She wanted it 
just as it was—the big tundras, his people, the herds, 
the mountains—with the glory and greatness of God 
all about them in the open spaces. She now understood 
what he had meant when he said he was an Alaskan 
and not an American; she was that, too, an Alaskan 
first of all, and for Alaska she would go on fighting 
with him, hand in hand, until the very end. His heart 
throbbed until it seemed it would break, and all th| 
time she was whispering her hopes and secrets to him 
he stroked her silken hair, until it lay spread over his 
breast, and against his lips, and for the first time in 
years a hot flood of tears filled his eyes. 

So happiness came to them; and only strange voices 
outside raised Mary’s head from where it lay, and took 
her quickly to the window where she stood a vision 
of sweet loveliness, radiant in the tumbled confusion 
and glory of her hair. Then she turned with a little 
cry, and her eyes were shining like stars as she looked 
at Alan. 


THE ALASKAN 


326 

“It is Amuk Toolik,” she said. “He has returned.” 

“And—is he alone ?” Alan asked, and his heart stood 
still while he waited for her answer. 

Demurely she came to his side, and smoothed his 
pillow, and stroked back his hair. “I must go and 
do up my hair, Alan,” she said then. “It would never 
do for them to find me like this.” 

And suddenly, in a moment, their fingers entwined 
and tightened, for on the roof of Sokwenna’s cabin the 
little gray-cheeked thrush was singing again. 


THE END 


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FALKNER OF THE INLAND SEAS 
•SON OF THE FORESTS 
’GREEN TIMBER 
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